Geographic Harbor 2
27 July 2016 | Boat position at Geographic Harbor: 58 06.111'N; 154 32.718'W
Pam Lau and Ted Berry
Picture: A grizzly bear just finished eating a salmon, looking rather satisfied.
"Geographic Harbor" is named after a Geographic magazine team that came to report on the massive Novarupta volcanic eruption of 1912. We can still see patches of volcanic ash in the crevasses and hollows throughout the nearby mountain range.
After breakfast, we took our dinghy to see the rangers and met them as they were coming out of their station by boat. They told us where to go to see bears and what to bring for protection and so on. We went directly to the end of the main channel. There were three charter boats and a steel sailboat already there. We stopped and talked to the people on the sailboat. They are from Germany, eight people on board, including the owners. They left their sailboat in Kodiak and their friends flew over from Germany to join them. A special feature about their steel sailboat is it can sit on the beach! They have a retractable keel so they just pull it up into the boat and then "ground" the yacht without hurting anything. Awesome!
The other three boats in the bay were charter boats specializing in hosting guests for bear viewing. Tourists (mostly photographers) fly in from Kodiak on a float plane and then go onboard the charter boat. The guests said they stay for four days and then the plane picks them up and flies them back to Kodiak. Everything is inclusive, meals, lodging, water boots, bug netting and so on. I am sure it would be pricey, at least for us retirees.
We beached our dinghy and walked up to a small group of people. Their guide greeted us and said we were welcome to join them. We were on a tiny island of pebble and sand between two small rivers. It is a perfect spot to watch bears because as they wander by on either side of the stream, it is far enough away but close enough to get some fantastic shots. After two hours, one group of tourist decided to go back to their boat and eat lunch so we did the same.
After lunch aboard "Shuang Yu", we saw a mama bear and two cubs on the beach near where we were anchored. We quickly took out the binoculars and had a good view of their activities. On the way out we saw another bear on the beach toward the entrance of our bay. We were very excited because we came more than a hundred miles out of our way and were naturally anxious to see them, even from a distance.
Shortly after our arrival back at the "island", a large grizzly nonchalantly sauntered along the stream on the other side of the bank toward us. Immediately the photographers turned their bodies toward the bear with their high quality cameras and the long range lenses, ready to shoot. I got out my small pocket camera and Ted with the Samsung cell 'phone, got ready to give it our best shot. The bear focused intensively on fishing and he was skillful. Right in front of our eyes, he caught two salmon within a short time. Seagulls were right there waiting to clean up the remains. About that time, our dinghy, which was about 300 yards (300 meters or so) away, needed moving because the tide was coming in and threatened to float it away. With some trepidation, we walked away from the group to fix it. Suddenly we were out in the open between a mama bear and her cub on one side and a large male on the other side of the river. Ted had a marine flare in his pocket and an air horn in his hand. These are wild dangerous beasts and there were no fences between us; the thought still makes me shudder! At the same time, we felt privileged to be so close to them. The experience reminded us of the time we visited Orangutan Refuge in Kumai, Indonesia on Boneo. Those huge animals were only a few feet from us. One of them even tried to get us to share our lunch with it. Both were experiences we will always remember.