We spot our first grizzlies fishing along the beach as the float plane carves down to the narrow inland sea at Hallo Bay on the Katmai Peninsula where we will disembark.
“The sows often take their cubs to the islands lying just off the coast to protect them from the males who will eat them if they can”, Lance, our guide crackles through the headphones.
Over a brushy 10’ rise at the water’s edge, a large ragged male, with a torn lip and gashed flanks calmly munches meadow grasses. At the more famous Katmai Visitor Center, people are well fenced away from the bears but in this unique spot, tourists can walk among the feeding animals. We are to maintain a 50 yard distance from the bears but they aren’t held to the same standards so closer encounters can happen.
Lance, is retired military living on Whidby Island in Washington State. He has been coming here during bear season every year for the past six.
“I’ve learned to read the bears”, he says. “They don’t see us as prey or a threat but things can change in a heartbeat”, he continues.
Bear spray and fire arms aren’t allowed on planes so the only protection in case of an unwanted encounter are traffic flares which Lance carries at his side.
The nutritious meadow forbs and grasses help fatten up the bears for hibernation. They also feed on salmon running up the river and scavenge along the beach for whatever they can find.
The bears on the coast are huge by grizzly standards, some almost as large as the Kodiak Island bears which are considered a sub-species and the largest of the lot. The coastal bears have access to better nutrition than inland bears, pushing up their weight by comparison.
Perhaps these bears are relatively docile because they are so well fed. You would never take a chance of an up-close encounter with bears in Denali or anywhere else.
The 5 hour tromp around the meadow among the behemoths feels like a hike through a cow pasture. The bears mostly ignore us, fixated on consuming calories. Only two cubs frolicking near their mother show any curiosity, advancing a little too close so we back slowly away and let them entertain us from a safer distance.
“The Park Service is lax about enforcing their own regulations”, Lance tells us. “Some tour operators take unnecessary chances around the bears, endangering themselves, their clients and ultimately the bears. If any encounter occurs, the animal will be killed”.
In 2003, Timothy Treadwell who spent 12 seasons supposedly studying the bears at Kaflia Bay some 30 miles down the coast, was finally killed and eaten by a bear, his girlfriend meeting the same fate. People do travel in the park and most take the necessary precautions to protect their own safety and that of the animals – establishing electric fences around camps, carrying bear spray and assiduously trying to avoid an encounter.
Treadwell deluded himself into believing that the bears were his friends and became overly familiar with them with tragic results.
“The Park Service never should have allowed this to happen”, Lance remarks. “They have a responsibility not just to visitors but to the animals, as well. Two bears were destroyed in the wake of this tragedy. But they allowed the travesty to go on year after year”.
