WildWatch Adventures
 
VISIONS OF MAJESTY From Mt. Douglas south past Devil’s Desk, the Barrier Range of the Aleutian Mountains was washed with patches of golden light as the sun broke through storm clouds and sent its shafts stabbing towards the ground. I’d picked up four clients and their gear in Homer, on the Kenai Peninsula, then loaded them into a DeHavilland Beaver for a one-hour flight southwest to Katmai National Park. We headed straight across Cook Inlet to Kamishak Bay, passing St. Augustine volcano and McNeil Falls, then turning south along the Alaska Peninsula. Passing Mt. Douglas, then Four-Peaked Mountain, we marveled at Four-Peaked Glacier, the titanic river of ice that flowed between those towering massifs down almost to the ocean. Just short of the beach, each outer toe of the glacier ended in a lake of emerald-blue water. This water melted the glacial toes, undercutting them until gravity took over and splintered the ice. Decades before, I’d been present as a huge berg groaned and roared, ripped free of the glacier, then crashed into the water, producing a small tidal wave that rocked the armada of other bergs already scattered across the lake – a wonder that few people have ever seen at ground level. Past Four-Peaked mountain opened the deep broad Kaguyak Valley, surrounded an ancient volcanic crater and cut by Big River, famed for its salmon fishering. Then on past Hallo Bay and into Kukak Bay. Although some flights end at the lodge in Devil’s Cove, our own destination was the tour boat and research vessel M.V. Waters. Captain John Rogers owned Katmai Coastal Tours, one of Alaska’s premier guiding services. Unlike most companies whose guides were boat or aircraft pilots, KCT employed only experts on bears and/or photography. With a gentle splash, our floatplane hit the waves and coasted to a stop. We were quickly ferried aboard the Waters, then replaced by a group of out-bound viewers chatting ecstatically about their recent experiences. Soon, we were on our way ashore. Kept dry by hipboots, we waded to the beach, then across a shallow river to a gravel bar where we sat for the next several hours watching brown bears racing after salmon and adolescent males sparing playfully. One mother with cubs, obviously nervous about two large males fishing nearby, walked around behind us, lay down almost 100 yards away, and began nursing her cubs. Even at that distance, the rumble of their purrs were clearly audible. Bear viewing just doesn’t get any better than that.
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MOMENTS OF GRACE Late June, the rutting season for grizzly/brown and black bears: Low-angle light from the setting sun filled the air with a golden glow, catching strands of red in the sedgegrass and making each blade burn like a tendril of flame. Flying bugs glowing like tiny incandescent Tinker Bells. And, then, the greatest magic of all: foxes. Weaving among several resting brown bears came two of the brilliant red canids – not trotting, but bouncing, as through the meadow were a giant trampoline. At the bottom of each bounce, they fell into a well of shadow where they looked as plump as well-fed house cats. But as each fox launched out of that shadow into the evening radiance, its fur burst into light, each hair like a sunbeam. Within that corona of fur, the body of each fox became a night-dark, silhouette that was amazingly scrawny.  (c) 2002 K. Fredrikkson Illusion replaced by reality ... for brief moments before the sun disappeared from sight, and twilight was upon the land. With the brightness went the heat, as though both had been blown away by the chill wind sweeping down off Hallo glacier. Chill that made me shiver, but which must have refreshed the bears whose thick coats had made them swelter in 80 degree daytime temperatures. Here in the Alaska wilds, there was nothing cool to drink, and nothing cool to sit in ... except the sea. Two hundred yards from me was a sow with twin yearlings. Shrugging off their late afternoon lethargy, they now arose and stretched. Both cubs began bawling until Mom relented, rolled onto her back, and let them nurse. Fifteen minutes later, these three bears, like several others, began drifting to the beach where a rapidly sinking spring tide had exposed a mile wide sand flat, home to tens of thousands of succulent razor clams. Pulling on a jacket, I too followed the retreating tide. As bears foraged, I filmed, until the light was gone. Finally, I just watched, immersed in peace and awe ... and never-ending wariness. For this was not Hollywood, but the Alaska wilderness were even the mighty bear sleeps with one eye open, so to speak. Wilderness, where the howling of a wolf is not just a symbol of ancient mysteries, but of primeval terror to those upon whom predators prey. Terror which I have personally tasted when surrounded by a pack of famished wolves one winter long ago. Illusion replaced by reality, yet again. * * * Within two weeks, the rutting boars had disappeared, and the last cubless sow had completed estrus, probably pregnant. Come January, some would likely produce cubs. Meanwhile, the usual summer drought had scorched the sedge grass. No longer succulent and nutty in flavor, but tough and fibrous, the sedge had become unpalatable to bears. The next set of clamming tides was still half-a-month away. And salmon were running in other streams. The huge glacial bowl of Hallo Bay was deserted except for a couple of sow-cub families, and one lonely biologist -- yours truly. Another month would pass before salmon hit this stream and the bears returned to hit them. As of now, the place to see bears was Geographic Harbor, quite a few miles south, or possibly on one of the intervening salmon streams. Each bay, each valley, hosts its salmon runs at somewhat different times; each has its own unique scenery, and its own host of ursine characters. Each setting is a unique experience. Each, in a different way, transforms the lives of those who come to share it. Not a permanent transformation, perhaps; but even a temporary re-creation of who we are can open us to realms of new possibility. Renewal In part because bears can be so dangerous, they force you to pay attention. The awe of being in their presence strips away the chaos of thoughts and distractions that normally dominate your consciousness. They focus your attention on the moment. They flood your blood with adrenaline and endorphins. They introduce you to terror, awe, amazement, and ecstasy. They connect you to the deepest pulses of life. This is their gift: the power to take your life or to renew it; to recreate who you are, if only for a moment, and perhaps for a lifetime. Steve Stringham (c) 2002
PREVIEWS OF YOU MIGHT EXPERIENCE
Fox at Katmai
(c) 2002 Kent Fredrikkson
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