Sc •111,>r r'lwndic,· Cupp lit1ed in Aluska the summer before his seniol' yeur tl'orkrny <IS (t decklwncl 011 afishinq !>out. I Photo by Owen llrnzun Having spent most of his life fishing, hunting and being outdoors, senior communication sciences and disorders major Chandler Cupp decided to spend the summer before his final year of college on an Alaskan fishing adventure. After attending his brother-in-law Harding alumnus Slader Marshall's wedding and connecting with a friend of Marshall, Tyler Emerson, Cupp accepted a fisherman's trip of a lifetime. "To actually pack up your stufffor a summer and go to a place you had never been away from your family and spend it with someone you have only met once is difficult," Marshall said. "It was an even bigger deal to do it while fishing on the open ocean." Cupp and Emerson talked at the wedding about the possible opportunity for Cupp to join him in Alaska for the summer. A few months later Cupp was in Marshall's restaurant, Slader's Alaskan Dumpling Co., and Marshall asked if he had given Emerson a call about his offer to join him in Juneau, Alaska, for the summer. Cupp called Emerson, who said he was serious about the offer. He offered Cupp to join him as his deckhand working onboard his fishing boat. Cupp accepted and bought a plane ticket that day to Juneau, the capital ofAlaska, located on the Gastineau Channel in the Alaskan panhandle. Upon his arrival in Juneau, Cupp spent a week staying with family and preparing the boat with Emerson. Cupp spent the rest of the summer working on the boat and fishing around Cape Spencer in southern Alaska, neither sleeping in a bed nor touching dry land for over a month. He slept in the front of the boat commonly know as the "folks hole" on a small cushion. "As hard as you would work during the day, it was the most comfortable bed I had ever slept in," Cupp said. Being at sea for several weeks, Cupp said he encountered all kinds of weather and wildlife. According 112 PEOPLE to Cupp, there was one week he only slept 10 hours due to a dangerous storm and shorter days of daylight. "This storm was like what you would see on the 'Deadliest Catch,"' Cupp said. "Rains blew sideways, and the sea swelled with waves up to 20 feet high. That was one of those times I was doing a lot of praying." Cupp said his favorite part was seeing all of the different wildlife: thousands of humpback whales, sharks, dolphins and the wide variety of fish they caught. On July 1, king salmon season began. Although they fished for both coho salmon and king salmon, king salmon was the "real moneymaker" and best quality of meat, according to Cupp. The biggest fish they caught all summer was a king salmon in the 30-40 pound range. Junior Matt Bingham, a friend of Cupp, said the hip changed Cupp's outlook on fishing and on life. "He returned enlightened, a changed man, at peace with himself and his surroundings," Bingham said. By Jluley Anwlone I Arist111u f.:iscr
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