Katmai: We're Going on a Bear Hunt!

I was pretty excited about this part of the adventure. Katmai National Park and Preserve is just a 15-minute floatplane flight away from King Salmon, and King Salmon is just a 20-minute drive away from Naknek. What's at Katmai? Salmon and grizzly bears, among other things (such as ritzy people from far, far away with big fancy cameras, expensive fishing poles, and brand new outdoorsy gear for wading in rivers). Andy suggested that Mom and I should take advantage of our proximity to Katmai, so I booked the flight a couple of months ago.

Mom has been scared of bears to some degree since we arrived in the further reaches of Alaska. Whenever I saw fourwheeler trails going into bushes and stepped off the roadside to explore, she began fluttering about grizzlies and being eaten and the bear attack book she read a couple of years ago (Andy sent it; thanks, Andy). 

Needless to say, going to a place to intentionally find and watch grizzly bears was something I admire her for. 

We got up early and saw the closest thing to an Alaskan sunrise we've seen during the whole trip.

Katmai Air, the conveyors of human cargo to (and most of the time from) the grizzly bears.

Here's our floatplane. It took off right from the river. 

Once we got to Brooks Camp, the well-developed and well-touristed part of Katmai, we had to go through bear orientation. It mostly involved tips for how to avoid death by bear... They gave us a nifty little pin after we graduated.

The landscape was stunning. I wish we could have spent several days there. Katmai has over 4 million acres, and I was so very well aware that I saw just the smallest smattering of them.

Brooks Camp has three different bearviewing platforms for the locations by the river that are most heavily populated by bears (that way you can watch the bears without getting eaten by one). It was pretty cool to walk up above on an elevated bridge and see all sorts of bear paths below. 

When not on a platform, you walked with the bears (sometimes quite literally). Bear prints and bear scat were everywhere. Sometimes paths are closed indefinitely when bears decide to hang out in the middle of them. Mom and I saw a couple of bears walking along, and even had the most aggressive one in the camp (who was doggedly pursuing his disinterested girlfriend) woof at us from the trees. We were incredibly grateful for the bear mace-bearing (I didn't mean for that pun to happen, I promise...) ranger we were walking with.

Mom's first grizzly of the day. She warmed up to them pretty fast.

We got to Katmai early enough to beat the rush and were rewarded with some great bearwatching time.  I am fully cognizant of the fact that this post is going to be monstrous from here on out. I have included far too many pictures, of which I am well aware. If you only knew how many didn't make it on here you would be lost in admiration of my self-control! I simply couldn't help myself.

The lower falls platform landing.

Here's our competition on the platform (and this was during the really slow time early in the morning!). You should have seen their cameras! Some of them spent all day right around here, I think.

The land around the falls was beautiful. Idyllic and bucolic and all that. I won't go into raptures, because that would just bore you. Plus my camera doesn't begin to do it justice. I zoomed and zoomed and now give you grainy, blurry pictures of a landscape that was anything but grainy and blurry.

The salmon were Mom's favorite part. I wanted to hike Dumpling Mountain (sounds grueling, yes?), but she really wanted to come back to the falls viewing platform for a second time to watch the salmon. I can't say I blame her. They are indomitable.

We also spotted a magpie or two...

...and ravens...

...and several types of waterfowl...

...and countless gulls.

[That wasn't one of them.]

After staying by the river for a while, I wanted to go exploring. So off Mom and I went. We found lakes and a road to the Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes, which is filled with ashflow from an eruption in 1912. The road was endless, and alas, we had to turn around without having seen any smokes. Nary a one of the ten thousand. [I knew going into the walk that we wouldn't be able to walk that far--they do bus tours and flightseeing trips, though.] We did find lots of other things, though. We were a bit tingly the whole time knowing that there were bears about, probably watching us from behind the trees...

We also found this little gem.

Who knew golden squirrels have gated communities? I convinced Mom to snoop just a wee bit, and we  discovered that gated communities in the heart of Katmai aren't quite so elaborate as we thought.

There were some big bears about, no mistake.

Back at the viewing platform, where an eagle looked down rather pompously at all the goings-on.

The salmon were much more beautiful than these pictures can show.

After a very full day, we got back on a floatplane and splashed into the wild blue yonder. Mom was pretty pleased to be co-pilot, I think. (All she had to do was act important.)

The water below us seemed like an impossible shade of turquoise. It was just lovely.

I have five different videos I was hoping to upload, of salmon jumping and a bear hunting and the bald eagle and my view from the floatplane and our landing on the river and all of that fun stuff, but they're too much for blogger to handle. If you want to see the videos, you'll just have to sit down for a visit sometime and I'll show you. :)