I arrived at Homer Air, the pilots/guides were all very nice and each of them had their dog with them there in the office. One was a beautiful Akita who I visited with and fed treats to while I waited for the other passengers. The other passengers arrived, we all put on boots provided by Homer Air (this should have been my first clue), then we went out to the plane. My new friend, Emily and I sat in the back and the other couple sat in the middle two seats. We had two pilots/guides, Skooter & Morgan.
The flight to Hallo Bay in Katmai State Park was about an hour. The scenery was beautiful we saw Mt. ReDoubt and a couple of glaciers along the way.
Once we got closer to Hallo Bay the clouds rolled in and our sunny day turned gray (should have been my second clue). As we came in for a landing, we could see the bears. Emily and I looked at each other in dismay….. There were a lot of them! We landed on the beach and got ready to walk in to see the bears. It was very windy and raining. The other passengers didn’t have rain pants, so I figured that I wouldn’t need mine (BAD DECISION). I left them in the plane with my back pack.
We walked up into the valley and immediately saw at least 4 bears. The first bears we came across were hanging out together - there was a male bear on the other side of the river. They were much more interested in watching him than they were in us being there close to them.
As he walked closer to them, he went down a hill where they could no longer see him. One bear moved closer to the river so that he could see him, the other bear sat straight up so that she could see where the big guy went.
The big bear finally made his way across the river and he walked up to the first two bears…. Keep in mind, we are standing not too far away from all three of them. Skooter told us that the two bears we started out watching were a male and female. Now with the big guy there - we had two males who both seemed interested in the female. The boys actually scuffled a bit and growled at each other YES WE COULD HEAR THEM!!!
After that the three of them just decided to hang out together and eat grass….. We decided to move along and see what else we could find. By this time it was POURING rain and the wind was blowing like crazy!!
Next we crossed the river (the reason for the boots!) and happened upon a mother bear and two cubs. Well, really we didn’t happen upon them. Skooter & Morgan visit this area sometimes 3 times per day, so they knew where the mom and cubs were. Unfortunately, the cubs were cold and wet too so they were bedded down right next to mom. We really couldn’t see them very well.
We decided to continue on to check out three more bears that we could see in the distance. We crossed another, deeper river and got really close to one of the three bears that we had been watching. She didn’t really mind us there and as we stood there, she slowly made her way toward us. Eventually Skooter asked us all to slowly back up and he moved in front of us. He made kind of a growling type of noise and the bear casually turned and walked the other way.
We stood there for quite some time and we counted about 8 bears all around us. Again, none of them were paying any attention to us - they were mostly just eating grass and hanging out.
The weather was continually getting worse, so Skooter decided it was time for us to head back toward the plane. We crossed back over both rivers and on the way back we visited another mother bear with one cub. We couldn’t see her too well as she had taken up residence behind a small hill. I think we were all ready to leave we were very cold and wet!!! It was quite a walk back to the plane - I would guess we went about 3 miles total.
We piled into the plane. The take off was pretty exciting at least for me, having never flown in a small plane before. It was very windy and visibility was not great. Skooter & Morgan did a great job, but we did notice that they were wiping off the windows to see. The hour flight back was very, very cold…. BRRRRRRR. We landed back at Homer Air just fine. We went back into the office took our boots off, took our socks off, rang the water out of them (I think I had an inch of water inside each of my boots) and put our shoes on. I guess I am glad that I went on this adventure. I think I would have liked it much more if the weather had been a bit better. The bears were amazing and even more amazing was the fact that we could get so close to them and they were not bothered about us at all. In fact, they paid no attention to us. Would I do it again? No, I don't think so....
Emily offered to drop me off at the Spit before she headed home. Dave and I had discussed where he would park the motor home and my plan was to find it and change my clothes…. Well, that didn’t work so well. I couldn’t find the motor home. I was SO WET and SO COLD. I found a restaurant, went in for coffee and chowder. While there, I had decided I would call a cab and have them take me to the Day Spa - all I could think about was a nice warm massage bed….. But then I would have to put cold wet clothes back on. UGH! I crossed the street looking for somewhere to buy some dry clothes - that is when I saw Dave and the folks from his charter waiting for their fish to be weighed. So there went my Day Spa Dream - LOL!
We took care of the fish and the shipping info. He had a great day, he caught 6 Halibut, but could only keep 2. He let 2 small ones go and he caught 2 more for the captain and first mate of the boat (they each get 2 fish). It totaled up to 26.8 pounds of actual fish that will be shipped to us! YUMMERS!!!! The fishermen had great weather, no rain and wind. I am really glad because he has looked forward to this for a long, long time.
I finally was able to take a nice HOT shower - wow did it feel good to be warm and dry. After that we went back to the spit, did a bit of shopping and had an early dinner.
Now - Dave is snoring away and I am uploading pics and watching Medium. It is raining again…. At least last night and this morning had some sunshine so that I could take some pictures of the mountains around us.
Tomorrow is our last day here in Homer. We have reservations to take the Ferry to Halibut Cove for lunch. Halibut Cove is a small town with a couple of Art Galleries and one restaurant. It should be a pretty ride and a relaxing day……
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