Katmai

(From Wikipedia) “Katmai National Park and Preserve is a United States National Park and Preserve in southern Alaska, notable for the Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes and for its brown bears. The park and preserve covers 4,093,077 acres.” To get there, you pretty much have to fly in on a float plane. There are no roads that go to the park or to the Brooks Falls area. In July and September, Brooks Falls is famous for bear watching, as the bears come to the falls to fish. There are an estimated 2200 bears in the park! Check out this map:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/49/Katmai_National_Park_and_Preserve_map_2006.09.png

Jim, Kim, Ed, Sandy, Dennis, Carol and I book a flight from Kenai with Alaska West Air, who has a plane big enough so we can all fly together. We meet in the morning at the airport, which is actually a lake. Inside the terminal, there are some outstanding wildlife mounts, and some very interesting pictures. Have you ever had your connecting flight delayed because a bear was on your plane? Happens a lot at Katmai!

  

We load up and start our flight.

  

One bonus of the trip is flying over some incredible scenery! Alaska is a land of many waters: there are rivers and lakes everywhere. Add in a number of active volcanoes and scenic mountains, and, well, what can I say. I spent the 2 hour flight riveted to the window.

Flying to Katmai VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

We arrive at Katmai and join a number of other float planes on the beach. We all troop up to the visitor’s Center, where we attend the mandatory Bear Etiquette seminar. Here I learn that what I always thought was a grizzly bear is actually a brown bear. Regardless, they can still eat you, so use whatever name you like. The key point is to stay out of reach of them! Bears always have the right of way.

  

Once we are indoctrinated, and have left all of our food and unneeded gear in bear-proof lockers, we are free to head for the falls. There is a good lunch buffet at the lodge, so most of us stop in for a bite to eat. Then, it’s off to see the bears! Up the path, you come to a bridge across the river. You may have to wait to cross, if there are bears in the vicinity. We hustle across the river, and up to the first viewing platform, just in case. Once you are up in the platforms, you are out of reach of any wandering bears. We hope…

  

  

You are likely to encounter bears at any point along the 1.5 mile trail to the falls. If we come upon any bears, I hope I can remember what they told us in the bear lecture! Thankfully, we pick up a uniformed ranger escort along the way, and I feel a lot safer. Hope she knows what we are supposed to do. Finally, we approach the falls viewing platforms on elevated walkways and get to see the bears.

  

There are two platforms: one somewhat down the river, and one right at the falls. In the gallery below are some shots from both vantage points. This is so cool! There are bears fishing at the falls and in the river, bears walking underneath the platforms, and all around us. The bears have become used to people being up on the platforms, so they really don’t seem to notice us at all. Check out these pix!

Bears! VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

This video is about 2 minutes long, and shows a bear fishing in the river below the falls. This is the “spot em and grab em” method.

Bears of Katmai

This video shows bears fishing at the falls, using the “let them come to you” method. Check out the salmon jumping up the falls in the foreground. Oh, this one is a bit graphic, so if watching fish get eaten isn’t your cup of tea, you may want to shut your eyes or something.

All too soon, it’s time to go…. I could have stayed for days! Actually, there is a campground (tents only) and a few rental cabins there at the park, but with the popularity of the place, it is very hard to get into either one. Maybe someday….  Back to the plane we go, and thankfully there are no bears sitting on it, so we climb in and fly away. Bye Bye, bears!

Getting close! We cross the Cook Inlet and approach our landing spot.

   

That’s the airport down there. You can see some of the group’s RVs parked near the airport. We turn on final and touch down on the lake. Man, what a day! One of the neatest things I’ve ever experienced, and another “only in Alaska” moment!