Guide Photos
Awesome sights on a daily basis!
Each day our guides see something new, it never gets old for these guys. Check out some of their photos from guiding bear and whale watching excursions.
Transient Orca 1 of 2
“Transient Orca are meat eaters and are frequently seen preying on seal, sea lions, dolphins, porpoises and even larger whales. Transient Orca seem to come and go. As their name implies, they are transient whales and just pass through. It is unclear as to their actual territory, if they even have one. These whales have been seen coming into the inside Strait of Georgia from the top end of Vancouver Island by Cape Scott and leaving at the bottom end by Victoria. Perhaps they circumnavigate Vancouver Island as well as meander back up or down our inside passages. They are routinely seen in the inside waters of BC.” Quote from: Whales and Dolphins BC / Wild Ocean Whale Society (WOWs) a great site to visit to learn more about marine life on the Bc coast. More tomorrow…
Grizzly Bears Cubs work
Grizzly bear watching prior to August 25th is along the shore of Knight Inlet, the Glendale River estuary and in the Glendale River. On these tours your are at eye level with the bears as they forage on the beach often with first year cubs. These cubs are may be only five months old and are much smaller than those in the previous day’s posting. But even at that age the cubs learn by copying their mother. This is an early season photo as you can see the fur that was rubbed of in the den has not had time to regrow.
Grizzly Bears Cubs wait
About 35 meters (yards) from the viewing platform we use after August 24th a tree has fallen across a small channel in the river. This tree has become a pathway for the grizzly bears that do not want to get their feet wet. That means bear cubs because they tend to avoid the water if they can. They use the log to watch their mother as she fishes in the river below and if she is too slow in catching a salmon it is a good place to rest.
Coming to the dock 1 of 3
The flight you catch in Campbell River leaves the harbour about 3:00 and arrives at the lodge about forty-five minutes later. As your luggage is loaded you may have notice that the extra room was filled with the all important groceries to keep the “larder” stocked. The size of the plane will depend on the number of guests and could be a Beaver or a Cessna.
Rare sunrise
Not a common sight but magnificent when it does occur – sunrise photos from the front deck of Grizzly Bear Lodge. Guides are up by 6:00 or 6:30, depending on the time of the season, to make fresh coffee and to finish setting the table for breakfast. Some guests are up when we rise others are called an hour later. In this case the “early bird does get the worm” (sunrise).
Guest comfort zone
Not much of a close up but the story is great. The guests are in a 5.5 meter (yard) skiff we use to watch grizzly bears on the Glendale River. We were moving slowly up the river (slowly because the motor is off and you are being towed by your guide) and had stopped watch a bear that moved around the point behind the bear in the photo. To the right of the guest’s head is another channel off to the right and this bear came out of the channel chasing a salmon. In all the splashing water the bear lost the salmon about 15 meters (yards) from the boat. It stopped, looked at us and then walked over to the point and continued to fish. No one got a good photo but I learned about the guests “comfort zone” and backed a little ways down the river and thus the photo.
Spring Grizzly Bear Bonus
Not bad for a pocket camera Pentax – Optio Wpi 6MP and 3X Optical Zoom. This posting is to let your imagination go and think of the photos with a “good lens” camera. We were close enough that my guests got some great photos, which were shared back at the lodge during the “bragging session”. This is when guests share the day’s photos and exchange email addresses so they can all get the photo they missed.
Grizzly Bear cubs finding
From our position in the viewing stands it was not hard to determine why the cubs were searching. Mother was the goal but more important is the food that they hope she will share. Often the mothers will fish in the deep water because they can pick up dead salmon off the bottom with little effort or waste of calories and also it is harder for the cubs to fight for the salmon while they are swimming.
Grizzly Bear cubs searching
Below the viewing stands (after August 24th ) we have two grizzly bear cubs swimming in the morning sun. The stands overlook the natural river as well as the entrance to the man-made spawning channel. These two cubs are not lost but rather on a mission. See tomorrow…
