The Sims Family.
54 years on this water.
Newhalen Lodge is the oldest lodge in Alaska under its original owner. The Sims family has been flying, guiding, and hosting anglers in the Bristol Bay region for 54 years.
Not a corporation.
A family.
Newhalen Lodge was founded and built by bush pilot Bill Sims — a man who learned this region from the air before most guests had ever heard of Bristol Bay. 54 years of flying and guiding knowledge in the watershed are the foundation of everything the lodge does, making it the oldest lodge in Alaska under its original owner.
The next generation — Bill Jr. and Fred Sims — grew up on Six Mile Lake. They know every productive bend in every river the lodge fishes. The guides who work here are not seasonal employees recruited from a job board; they are specialists who return season after season, learning the water deeper every year.
When you stay at Newhalen Lodge, you are a guest in a family operation that has staked its entire reputation on doing this one thing extraordinarily well.
Why 14 guests. Not 40.
The Sims family made a deliberate decision to cap the lodge at 14 guests per week. Not because they couldn't build more cabins. Because 14 is the number at which every guest receives genuine personal attention, every floatplane gets off the dock without double-tripping, and the fishing pressure on every river they access remains sustainable.
This is the model of a family that actually cares about the resource they've built their lives around. The Bristol Bay watershed is not infinite. Treating it like it is would be a betrayal of everything the Sims family has stood for.
The result is a lodge where the hosts know your name, the guides remember your casting stroke from last year, and the fish you release will be there for the next generation.
Meet the team in person.
Contact us to discuss availability, the program, and what week fits your goals.