As I have said frequently in this blog that one of the best methods of whale or killer whale watching is to sit quietly. If you are able to be in an area as we were on this day with no other boats the orca tend to approach closer and are curious. They are a dolphin and dolphins like to play with moving boats and orcas seem to approach resting boats. The picture is the proof.
If you book the extra day in camp we take a forty-five minute boat tour across Knight Inlet through Thompson Sound to the Kakweikan River where spend a day with Trapper Rick. This river is located on the BC mainland where we travel by road to Rick’s cabin. The first photo is the view from the deck of the cabin down the river overlooking the falls. The second photo is from below the falls back toward the cabin. On the left of this picture is the fish ladder built to assist the salmon around the falls that they had been jumping over for thousands of years. (Never question a government when it has money to spend.) The area below the falls is good for grizzly bear viewing, as it is one of their main fishing spots. We tend to sit on the deck and wait for the bears to appear and also hike to the lower pool another popular feeding area.
If you choose to spend an extra day at Grizzly Bear Lodge it is normally spent with trapper Rick. On this day we cross Knight Inlet through Thompson Sound to the Kakweikan River a forty-five minute boat ride. The ride may be longer because we often encounter pacific white-sided dolphins and black bear. This river is located on the BC mainland and we travel by road to Rick’s cabin. The first photo is the view from the deck of the cabin overlooking the salmon ladder and the falls. The second is guests on a mission to get photos of grizzly bears fishing below the falls. As normal when traveling in this area Rick is in the lead and the lodge guide brings up the rear and take occasional the picture.
To view a map of the areas mentioned scroll down the sidebar on the left to “Pages” then to “Google Map of Grizzly Bear Lodge Itinerary”.
If guests are interested and Ingo’s crew from Germany was there is some great salmon fishing while visiting Trapper Rick. This protected river provides opportunities for guests to spin fish for salmon with light gear that often gives the salmon the advantage. The protected aspect means that anyone fishing the river must have a guide which has been allotted time on the river and therefore it is not open to the public. The only other people we see and that is rarely are from a lodge that brings guest in by helicopter and you can guess what that costs.
As this photo taken by Ingo shows the extra day visiting Grizzly Bear Lodge includes a trip to the Kakweikan River and a day with Trapper Rick and a visit to his cabin. The cabin is a half-hour truck ride over logging roads and then a fifteen-minute hike through the coast rainforest. This past summer we had excellent grizzly bear viewing at the falls below the cabin. This is one location that has no visitors except for the loggers and the guest from our lodge, a true wilderness river.
This is a photo that many guests try to obtain but are not always successful. The fall grizzly bear tours from the lodge travel 26 miles up Knight Inlet to the Glendale River and the man-made spawning channel. The viewing stands over look the entrance to the spawning area and there are several small falls prior to the weir and a large holding pool for the humpback salmon before they move into the channel. This is a salmon buffet and the grizzly bears love to come down to dine. You can imagine the number of salmon (in the thousands in a small area) required for Ingo to get a photo of one leaving the water.
From a guides perspective this is a good view of a seaplane at the dock of Grizzly Bear Lodge. The first reason would be that we are on the water and not carrying luggage or boxes of food up to the lodge. The second is that if we were on the dock carrying luggage it is a high tide. The float is about the same level as the shore and this makes the trips allot easier. The summer tides can be four or five meters (yards) in height and this makes for a steep ramp up to land level. The flight to the lodge from Campbell River takes about forty-five minutes and flies over some great coastal scenery so be sure to have your camera at hand and not stowed in your suitcase.
The old stumps such as seen in the above photo are found along the road to the grizzly bear viewing stands, on the forest walk on the extra day spent at the “wild river” and on the walking trail behind Grizzly Bear Lodge. The notches cut into the stump, on the right, were for the springboards used by hand loggers. These boards were to raise the loggers up the tree trunk to an area that was narrower than at the base were it would take less time to “fall” the tree. Remember that hand logger means the long two-man hand saw using “armstrong” power and not motorized.
Guests arrive by seaplane from Campbell River on Vancouver Island. The floatplane ride takes about forty-five minutes and passes over many small islands, bays and inlets. For many guest it is their first ride in a small plane and they may be a little nervous but in all my years on the coast any accidents and they are rare occur due to winter weather. It is comforting to know that “seaplanes” land on water and that is every where on the coast while the larger planes that you use it come to British Columbia require large airports and they are less common than all the water under a seaplane. Lynn Morris from the Great Britain provides these photos of her flight.
Just like that another season has come to an end. We are grateful for all the wonderful staff and the guests this season. It was an excellent season and we are already looking forward to next May.
One of the highlights of the season was all of the new cubs out. It was awesome to see so many new cubs of the year and that is great news for our bear populations moving forward. We had great spring viewing and this continued through summer. On our river trips we started to see salmon arriving in August and enjoyed some great shoulder season viewing. The fish at the viewing platforms were a little late showing up this year, but viewing during late September at the platforms was great and the estuary viewing remained strong throughout the season.
Out in the whale watching world it was another year that saw large numbers of resident Orca who remained in the area right into October. The Humpback viewing was also great with large numbers feeding in Blackfish Sound. It is so amazing to have these magnificent animals back in our waters in such numbers.
Over the winter and spring we will be doing some repairs and maintenance. We rebuilt the front deck last spring, utilising cedar cut on site. We will continue with some siding, rooms improvements and hopefully a floating sauna ready for the start of our season.
2026 is already looking like a very busy season for us. We only have limited high season availability so please book early to ensure we have space for your group.
Looking forward to seeing you next year
Angus Reid
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