Alive In The Wild!
- nwriversphotograph
- Oct 14
- 6 min read
Early morning, sitting streamside as the fog and mist begin to rise. Silence, except for the slap of spawning salmon making their way upstream, swirling in the eddy, attaining over and around each new impasse on the final step of their life’s journey. This is absolutely the best way to start any day -- looking downstream on a river, peering into the translucent moss, grey rock, ancient cedars, all in hope of that first small movement, that shift of light, that crack of a branch –the first potential reveal of approaching wildlife.
The day is full of anticipation, and I am fully alert and with just a hint of anxiety. This is exactly where I’ve wanted to be, deep within the Great Bear Rainforest (Great Bear), home to bears, wolves, kingfishers, and whales. Anxiety, not because it is not as beautiful or as spiritual as I expected (it is exactly that!), but apprehension as I wait to see if this special place will open itself to me and share its special treasures? This is the home of spirit bears (Ursus americanus kermodei) and coastal grey wolves (Canis lupus crassodon), two unique and rare species that I have never seen in the wild and that are on the very top of my list to see and photograph.
My wife Stephanie and I are here with four other photographers (now friends) to see what this special place will allow us to experience. We are part of a trip with Ocean Light Adventures aboard the sixty-foot vessel, Afterglow I.
A short hike to the stream, introductions to our native Gitga’at hosts Marven, William and Deon, setting up tripods, selecting aperture and speed on the camera, and then the wait to see what might show up. A few hours of slowly letting the beauty and ambiance of the area sink into our souls, acclimating to the utter stillness and the soft sounds of nature, the cry of the jay and kingfisher… then…. not far downstream, a black paw and claws slowly emerge from the brush on river left, followed by mama black bear and her cub. The day was on!
With the transformation from misty morning to sunny afternoon, we watched the bears fish in the water, splashing around, falling off logs, tripping over rocks, and just letting us have a window on their lives for a few hours. Eventually they made their way upstream and away from our view. Not too long after, another visitor, a white Kermode (spirit or ghost bear) made his/her way upstream. The Kermode are a rare subspecies of black bear with a rare white fur mutation, with only one to five hundred estimated to exist in the wild. Spending time with this bear (we saw two over three sightings on our trip) was something we have longed to experience.
This area, the mostly untouched and still wild Great Bear, stretches for more than two hundred and fifty miles along British Columbia’s (BC) western coast. It is part of the larger Pacific temperate rainforest ecoregion, which is the largest coastal temperate rainforest in the world. Its southern boundary begins near Knight and Bute Inlets on BC’s mainland and just north and east of Vancouver Island, and extends up the Portland Canal to the small towns of Stewart and Hyder on the Alaskan/BC border.
This twenty-one-million acre wilderness is a land of mist and rain, old-growth cedars, waterfalls, mountains, and glacially cut fjords. It is a special place where the Coastal Mountains meet the ocean and is home to sea-otters, sea lions, Humpback, Fin (the second-largest whale species on earth), and Killer whales, mountain goats, and grizzly, black and the rare Kermode bear.
I have been in this remote, untamed neighborhood before. In 2017, my wife Stephanie and I took a trip on the Raincoast Conservation Foundation’s sailboat Achiever. We sailed out of Bella Bella and cruised north to the Fiordland Conservancy marine park located near Kynoch and Mussel Inlets, and at that time, our trip fees went to purchase a license to hunt grizzly bear. A loophole in Canadian policy failed to specify hunting with a camera vs a gun, and so, to our thinking (and that of the Conservancy), we saved two grizzlies that year! We also shared one early morning with coastal wolves. No sightings, but following their tracks through the sand and listening to their howls in the forest. Soon after we returned, on November 30th of that year, grizzly bears were protected from all hunting in the Great Bear by the BC government.
In 2021 I flew into the Khutzeymateen Sanctuary, the first area in Canada to be protected specifically for grizzly bears and their habitat. And at least every other year, I try to pry my way into the Great Bear by visiting the Bella Coola Valley. There are so many wonderful places on this earth, and I have been blessed to visit many of these. The Great Bear remains my favorite. Its beauty is unmatched, and its days of rain, fog and mist put me at ease with a feeling of intimacy and being at home.
This trip sems different as Stephanie and our new friends motor south from Kitimat on the Afterglow I. It is sunny and warm. Where are the rain and grey skies? Are we in the right place?
I first went to the Khutzeymateen with Ocean Light and was impressed with their small, personalized tours and extensive knowledge and experience with the wilds of the BC Coast (the crew on both trips: Barrett, Jill, Franco, Jenn, and Chris were just phenomenal people). As lifelong conservationists, Stephanie and I were drawn to Ocean Light’s more-than thirty-year history of working together with first nations and nonprofits to save the grizzlies of the Khutzeymateen Valley, and later with the campaign to save the territory of the grizzly and the spirit Bear. This history flows throughout their philosophy and trip agenda, and is evident by the mutual and obvious respect and friendships between crew and the native inhabitants of the Great Bear. I don’t often do endorsements, but if you want to visit this area, charter a trip with Ocean Light.
The Great Bear has been inhabited by Indigenous peoples for over 11,000 years, and twenty-six BC First Nations claim traditional territory in the rainforest. This includes the Gitga’at, Gitxaała, Haida, Heiltsuk, Kitasoo Xai’Xais, Metlakatla, Nuxalk and Wuikinuxv that together form the Coastal First Nations (CFN). CFN was instrumental in developing the 2023 Great Bear Rainforest Land Use Order and 2016 Great Bear Rainforest (Forest Management) Act, both of which protect a large amount of this area. During our trip, we heard stories, history and interacted primarily with members of the Gitga’at tribe in their roles as Guardian Watchmen (individuals from First Nations communities who actively monitor, protect, and restore their traditional territories and resources) along the local rivers and streams.
Late in our day, as we were packing up and with the advance of twilight and the soft approach of evening, mist arising once more, we just didn’t want to leave. So, we took one longer, wistful look upstream in the hope of seeing … a grey coastal wolf on the sandbar! Not one but three, with another two already lost among the trees. A fantastic end to a fantastic day… but we were not done yet. We waited, and heard our wolves howl into the night. It was pure magic! A few minutes later, the answering howls from the other pack members, swirling, echoing over and along the ridgetops, filtered across our senses, the full promise of wild places, solitude, and, as darkness descended, an unmatched sense of peace, connection, and wellbeing.
This is being alive in the wild! This is a day in the Great Bear!
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