As I typed out the title to this post, it occurred to me that I might want to consider re-naming this trip. While the bears of Katmai National Park are definitely the highlight, there is a lot more to this journey than the bears. Then again a title like: “Bears, Volcanoes, Seals, Sea Lions, Eagles, Whales, Coastal Landscapes, Huge Mountains, and Quaint Seaside Towns” is probably a bit wordy.
Anyway, this trip started off with a short extension by one of the clients. Fred contacted me more than a year back, as he was planning an ongoing project to photograph every national park in the United States. It’s a big project, and my job was to get him to a few of the Alaska National Parks on this trip. After a couple of days, two additional clients would join us for the main part of the workshop.
I picked Fred up in Anchorage and we headed down the road toward Seward and Kenai Fjords National Park. Arriving in the early afternoon, we dropped off bags at our lodging and then headed out to Exit Glacier for a hike up the Harding Icefield Trail near Exit Glacier. It was a beautiful sunny afternoon, and by the time we topped out at Marmot Meadows, the glacier was glowing white and blue under the afternoon sun.
While seeing this small land-bound corner of Kenai Fjords was great, the big part of our experience was the following morning, when the two of us jumped on a small boat with just four other passengers for a day trip of the tidewater glaciers, and wildlife of the actual Kenai Fjords. And like all of our best-laid plans… it went sideways.
We pulled out of Seward in the fog, but that quickly dissipated as we motored south down Resurrection Bay. The sun rose through the fog and over the mountains, offering a great start to what looked to be a beautiful day. As we paused to photograph a cooperative Sea Otter, someone on the boat noticed a small sheen of oil on the surface of the water around one of the outboards. The boat Captain gave it one look and said, “Sorry folks, that’s it, we’ve got to go back”.
He killed the leaky engine, which kept the fuel from dripping any more into the water, and we started limping our way back toward the Seward Harbor on one engine. Meanwhile, I started scrambling to come up with an alternative plan.
And that’s why you hire a guide… (Sorry, but I’m going to give myself a shameless plug.) Local guides know who to call when things go sideways. We know the people to contact, and can do far more on short notice than someone who doesn’t know the area intimately. That’s why we get paid to do what we do. We may not always be able to solve the problem, but your odds are much better when you’ve got me, or another knowledgeable local, on your side.
Still in cell contact, I called the first person that came to mind, Laura Schneider, captain of the Caroline, the boat I’d spent a few days on just a week before. I didn’t know if Laura would be available or what her luxury yacht might cost for a day trip, but I knew she’d know who to call. Turned out, I didn’t need to make another call. She was in town, available, and happy to take Fred and I out. I asked around the boat, and every one of the other passengers opted to join us, making the price identical to what they’d paid for the aborted tour.
Boom. Day saved.
We arrived back in the harbor, walked a few rows down and made our way onto the Caroline where Laura and her deck hand were waiting. Take 2, we were on our way back into the Bay.
We ended up having an exceptional day, with Orcas, humpbacks, Sea Lions, otters, birds, mountains, waterfalls, and glaciers.
Katmai – Brooks River
Early the following morning, back in Anchorage, we met my two remaining clients, Gail and Andrew, and headed to the airport for the short flight to King Salmon, and then on to Brooks Falls in Katmai National Park.
Whenever I make this trip, it surprises me. Within a couple hours of leaving Anchorage, you can find yourself nose to nose (no, not literally) with the Brown Bears of Katmai. We arrived in King Salmon and quickly transferred to Katmai Air for the flight to Brooks. Well before noon, we were making our first images of the bears.
We had three full days at the Brooks River. We caught the peak of the salmon run, and fish were leaping at the falls with such frequency they were impossible to count. The bears were gorging themselves, and we were rarely outside of photographic distance of at least one, and sometimes as many as a 20 bears.
Brooks Falls, due to its popularity, gets a bad reputation from some photographers. Inevitably, those are people who have not visited Brooks for themselves. Yes it’s popular, and yes it can get crowded. But it is also one of the best places I know of to consistently and successfully create memorable and beautiful images of Brown Bears in their environment. There are also tricks to visiting – when you arrive early and stay late, you can avoid most of the crowds and catch the best of the day’s light. The day trip tourists are the ones that fill the place up, so you plan your day accordingly, avoiding the popular platforms during the busiest mid-day hours, and taking advantage of them when the light is best and the crowds are gone.
Katmai – Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes
On our final day, the four of us took a day-trip to the Valley of 10,000 Smokes, which apart from the bears, is the defining feature of Katmai National Park. Formed as the result of the Novarupta eruption in 1912, the valley is essentially a vast plain of volcanic ash 600 feet deep. With rivers and streams cutting through the soft sediment in deep canyons, it is a bizarre, desert-like, landscape, and photographically interesting.
Homer
After our time in Katmai, we found ourselves back in Anchorage and the following morning on our way down the Kenai Peninsula to Homer. By early afternoon we were looking over the views of Kachemak Bay and the mountains across the water. A quick drop of the bags and we were off to the small boat harbor and an afternoon trip around the bay.
No need for a blow by blow, but on our four-hour journey we had hundreds of seals, repeated fly-bys by eagles, and packs of otters so big it seemed we could hop across the bay atop their fuzzy stomachs.
The following day we’d planned on a day-trip to the coast of Lake Clark National Park, but high winds and low clouds got in the way. Sadly, there is no one a guide can call to adjust the weather. So we made the most of the day, by heading out to Anchor Point to photograph the abundant eagles, and wandering the beaches of Homer.
Katmai Coast
Fred and I said farewell to Gail and Andrew that evening, when I put them on the Ravn Alaska flight back to Anchorage, and onto their next adventures in Southeast Alaska. Fred and I lingered another day, hoping the weather would clear sufficiently to make the trip over to the coast of Katmai.
And it did. The following morning we climbed into a Cessna 206, run by Smokey Bay Air and took off for the Katmai Coast. The flight over from Homer requires the pilots to climb to nearly 10,000 feet which means spectacular aerial views of the remote Barren Islands of southern Cook Inlet. Aerial views, as they always do, made me want to get down on the ground and explore on foot. Someday, maybe.
We hit two spots on the Katmai coast, looking for bears, but we mostly found was spectacular landscapes. We did see a few bears from a distance, which was fine, but it was the fields of fireweed with distant volcanoes and glaciers that were worth the price of admission.
Alaska is an amazing place. I’ve lived here over 20 years and yet I’m regularly reduced to slack-jawed amazement by the state in which I live. In this short, week-long trip, we saw hulking bears snatching salmon from the air, yearling cubs at eye level and feet away, Bald Eagles preening atop driftwood logs, and sweeping low over our boat, calving glaciers, whales, meadows of fireweed that seemed to extend for miles, and… well there is just too much to include. Alaska is just that kind of place.
Interested in joining me on a similar itinerary in 2020? I’ve still got a couple of spots available. Check it out HERE.
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