Bear Viewing at Katmai National Park

Seeing them in their natural habitat up-close is a life changing experience...

When I started planning the trip to Alaska, I knew that bear viewing was the on my "Must do" list. There are a number of tour operators for bear viewing trips, some departing from Anchorage, others depart from Homer, which is a lot closer to the Katmai National Park or Lake Clark National Park. I chose to spend a few days in Homer and take a bear viewing tour from there. Not sure about the weather, I did not pre-book the tour. After dialling a few numbers, I finally got us booked into the afternoon tour for a 5 hour bear viewing trip.

There are two main destinations to view bears: Katmai National Park and Lake Clark National Park. Both places are ideal because large numbers of bears congregate on the coast around food sources such as clams, sedge grass meadows and salmon runs. I have read so much about Katmai that I had my mind set on it already. However, we were told on the phone that it wasn't going to be a choice of ours, but subject to weather, wind and tide of time. When our pilot announced to us that we will be taken to Katmai, I was like "Yeah!" .

There are six of us in total, including our pilot/naturalist guide Ben. An entire hour went by unnoticed as the view was simply so breathtaking that we all wished the flight could be longer. We flew over Homer Spit, Kachemak Bay, volcanoes...and thoroughly enjoyed what Alaska had to offer from the air.

View of Volcano Carter

After a bumpy descend, we landed safely on the beach of Hallo Bay of Katmai National Park, and the bear viewing begins...

Hallo Bay, Katmai National Park

After a "bathroom break" - This means ocean for the men and "behind the tall grass" for the ladies. However, Ben did make sure that there were no sleeping bears in the grass. After all, we were going to spend the next 3 hours here where there is no bathroom available.

All settled, we lined up in a single line and marched into the vast opening following. The single line is to make sure that we cause the least amount of damage to the grass as they are the main diet of the bears.

The first bear we came across was a male grizzly sleeping by a stream. We have probably woken him up as he decided to get up and cross the stream to put on a show for us.

Sleeping bear

We were told that when a bear approaches us, we should kneel down to show respect and that we mean no harm. This male bear had us kneel down for almost an entire hour as he got closer and closer, munching on sedge grass. At some point, he was only around 5 meters away, looking up to check us out from time to time. Ben told us that this is the only place in the world where you could get so close to a bear without having to run for your life.

I was really hoping to catch a shot of the bears fishing Salmon. As this is early July, it is a couple of weeks too early to catch this scene. However, it is the best time to see female bears with their cubs.

Three hours went by before we knew it and it was time to leave. We felt so excited and privileged to have a chance to visit the grizzlies in their natural habitat. The bears knew we were there but they didn't mind sharing their home with us. For photography lovers, the glaciers in the national park provides a majestic backdrop for the pictures.

A bear clamming on the beach

It was almost 21:00 when we departed Hallo Bay. The sun light softened and casted a golden hue over the beautiful scenery. I knew that I will be back again...

Click "Play" to see the youtube video of the trip:

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