Tag Archives: Travel

We Bear It Well

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Thursday 26 August 2022 – The plan for the day was to get to Thompson Sound, up the Kakweekan River, a salmon river (aren’t they all, round here?) where it might be possible to see more bear action. As the day before, the start was a boat journey for some 90 minutes with the lovely Sylvie at the wheel and James generally leading and giving us the benefit of (a) his knowledge and passion for the local ecology and (b) his dry-as-dust sense of humour.  The two of them kept an eye out for shore-based wildlife as we went

and I tried not to worry about the driver taking her eye off the road. Actually, the chance of a traffic accident was, of course, pretty remote.

We passed a couple of salmon farms on the way,

and James explained the negative impact these have had over the years they’ve been established here.  It’s impossible to farm salmon without diseases affecting them.  If you put 100 people in a room for an extended period, for example, eventually sickness will spread; imagine that with salmon, but of course with vastly greater numbers of fish.  The problem comes not with the farmed salmon infecting wild ones coming upriver to spawn, but with the smolts coming down-river after hatching; these catch the diseases and inevitably spread it among the wild salmon population.  The wild salmon population is thus drastically reduced, which affects all the animals for which the salmon are prey; eagles, dolphins, orcas and, of course, bears.  Fortunately, the number of salmon farms is decreasing as environmental activists, including the First Nations, exert pressure and even big business is beginning to understand that the environmental downside is worse than the commercial upside.  The result has been (as seen everywhere where this has happened) an inverse correlation between salmon farms and the health of the local ecology.

We also passed a school of dolphins, who came over to investigate us and entertained us with their exuberance and skill.

The next stage of the journey was a short ride in a (heavily modified) four-wheel drive truck

Where I took the chance of getting a team photo – Sylvie on the truck, James on the right.  After the ride, and some safety briefing from James about how to minimise the risks in case we came across a bear unexpectedly (stay together, no buggering off on your own to take photos, no screaming if you saw a bear, that kind of thing), we set off on a short hike

which led to a river that had to be crossed by a small boat on a rope system.

A few more metres along the track, Sylvie led us off to a place where we had a decent view of a decent view.

It’s interesting to note that, as free-flowing as this river seems, it’s very low, because there hasn’t been enough rain to supply it.  We could see salmon – pink salmon, the small ones – making their way upstream, and while the river is alarmingly low, this is extremely good news.  In previous years there were no salmon, so the bears couldn’t feed.  The unique nature of grizzle bear biology concerns foetal development.  A pregnant grizzly bear will maintain a foetus for a while before implanting it so it can develop, to feed up in order to support the coming cub.  If there’s not enough to eat, the foetus will not implant, but instead will be terminated.  The result has been a couple of years with no bear cubs at all, which is why seeing salmon in this river is such good news.  James mentioned later that we were not, erm, out of the woods yet and that it needed to rain immediately, long and heavily in order to sustain the environmental cycles.

Anyhoo, our time in the spot by the river gave us the tiniest insight into the nightmare world of wildlife photographers.  We sat there for a good two hours and nothing happened, beyond the odd salmon or two leaping up the falls. We took a short break for lunch at a nearby spot – once the abode of “Trapper Rick” but now shared by Farewell Harbour and a couple of other interested parties.

and then returned to where we were, where nothing continued to happen for another hour or so.  Sylvie came round our group trying to establish a “should we stay or should we go” consensus.  Had she suggested that we all leave, I would have happily taken up on it; but the feeing among the group was to stay, so I kept quiet.

Two minutes – two minutes – later….

Which just goes to show that I have lessons to learn about patience. A bear appeared and calmly walked by, just below us, and crossed the falls in search of salmon.

We hastily – and quietly – moved to a lower viewing spot so we could watch the bear fishing. This spot had been occupied by another group, led by a couple of First Nations guides; but they had followed us to the cabin and were eating their lunch, so we had their spot to ourselves!

We were phenomenally lucky.  Not only did the bear walk closely enough for some great photos, but then we were able to witness this.

It was spellbinding.  The other group, alerted by James (there is constant communication between groups, sharing wildlife sightings and other information by radio) came hurrying back, so we moved out of the way to let them carry on the viewing.  At that precise instant, and before the other group had a chance to get the same view we had, the peace and quiet were cataclysmically shattered as a helicopter came over.  It didn’t just fly over, it swept sideways up the river at very low altitude, making a hell of a racket.

The bear, of course, was utterly spooked

and shot off into the woods on the far side, never to return.  So the second group never got the chance to see what we’d seen and, more importantly, the bear lost the chance to eat salmon.  It seemed that it was a government-sponsored flight for the purposes of counting fish.  One understands that These Things Must Be Done, but this individual episode cast a bit of a pall over the proceedings.

There was clearly no point in staying there, as the chance of seeing the bear again was minuscule, so we headed back, now in sunshine. Sylvie showed us a bear rubbing tree on the way back.  Bears will use a tree for a variety of purposes; scratching that elusive itch, of course, but also as a way of communicating with the local ursine community.  Scratching leaves scent and the higher the scent, the bigger the bear – a warning to others about who’s the boss around here.  Bears tend to choose sappy trees, and if you look closely, you can see individual hairs stuck in the sap.

On the way back, we passed the school of dolphins again and they obliged by entertaining us once more

and Sylvie spotted a black bear on a distant shore.  Quite how she was able to do this is beyond me, as I could hardly see it even when I knew where it was.  But there it was

looking for berries to eat.

A day which at one stage looked like it would be a dead loss (I had envisaged a post called “Doesn’t Bear Repeating”) had turned out to be richly rewarding.  I felt really privileged to have witnessed today’s episodes, particularly the fishing, and hugely lucky to have scored the photos and videos now safely ensconced on my laptop.

The dinner back at the lodge was, as ever, absolutely delicious, and was followed by an interesting talk by Sylvie about “Heroes of the Forest”, by which she meant fungi and mycelia, essential components of an arboreal ecosystem.

And that, beyond a certain amount of drinking and conversation, was that for the day – richly rewarding, deeply interesting and hugely enjoyable (my earlier boredom has been largely forgotten).

This was our last evening here, and so we have to prepare to leave tomorrow.  We travel to Port Hardy, thence to Vancouver and onwards to Whitehorse for another three-day adventure.  The ever-excellent Tim has ensured that we have some entertainment laid on to divert us from the tedium of simply sitting around in an airport awaiting a flight.  So come back tomorrow (or thereabouts – the internet connection here is not something one can rely on) to find out how our day and our journey went.

Farewell to Victoria – Victoria to Farewell

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Tuesday 23 August 2022 – For reasons which will become clear, this will be a fairly brief post, somewhat hastily cobbled together. I hope you enjoy the photos, though.

The day started well, in that we were up promptly, breakfasted, checked out of the hotel and in for our private charter flight, a small float plane, from Victoria to the Farewell Harbour Lodge. For a while, though, it all fell apart. The lass behind the check-in desk at Harbour Air told us that there would be a delay. It wasn’t quite clear why for a while, but eventually we understood the situation. Cloud and fog made flying in to Farewell Harbour too dangerous in the view of the Harbour Air despatcher, who was therefore unwilling to send a plane to us in Victoria unless the situation at the far end cleared. We were advised to wait and see whether the weather and the forecast changed. New forecasts came in every hour, and each one indicated that visibility would still be a problem.

Naturally, we started pondering alternatives, but the raw truth is that we needed to get somewhere over 500km away to an island in the Johnstone Strait, so flagging down a cab or seeking a bus ride wasn’t really an option. Even driving to the nearest place on Vancouver Island whence we could catch a water taxi looked too difficult.

Despite the best efforts of BT, whose circuitry detected a crisis and therefore implemented a cap on Jane’s phone, we managed to contact Discover Holidays, who are looking after us whilst we’re in Canada. Fortunately, Jane got through to a lady called Sarah, who had worked on developing our itinerary with the heroic Brendan at NATS, so we didn’t have to waste time explaining the problem to her. The idea of a driver was mooted, but then all of a sudden, a plan came into being which was to fly us as near to Farewell Harbour as the weather allowed (e.g. Campbell River) and take a water taxi from there. So we got our plane after all.

We climbed in, buckled up and the pilot taxied out past the air traffic control tower

(because Victoria Harbour is unique in Canada because it actually has a runway marked in the harbour), and off we went. Conditions were pretty clear, so here are some of the photos we managed to garner as we went:

Victoria Harbour, with the breakwater we walked around yesterday at the top of the picture;

Butchart Gardens;

evidence of some fairly drastic logging;

several views showing what a big slab of land Vancouver Island is;

a couple of arty attempts on my part;

a photo by Jane of Campbell River (meaning – yippee! – it had cleared and we were carrying on all the way to our proper destination);

coming down towards our landing and skimming along just below the clouds; and finally

arrival at Farewell Harbour Lodge, where we found out a couple of interesting nuggets. Firstly, the pilot of our plane (a De Havilland Beaver – I was going to call this post “Nice Beaver” but Jane gave me One Of Her Looks) was named, appropriately, Dakota; and secondly, Tim, the proprietor of the lodge, could take the credit for us arriving, as it was his suggestion that we fly as far as the weather allowed, and he was pretty sure it would clear, as indeed it did.

It was, thus, with considerable relief that we arrived at the lodge (which looks great and seems very well-organised)

only some five hours late and just in time to get a beer in as Tim gave us the indoctrination spiel. A key fact that emerged from this is that tomorrow will be an early start, hence my brevity. I am being brief. Yes, I am.

We actually peered round the back of our cabin and found where they park the boats, as well as this scene

which is documentary proof that you can indeed have your kayak and heat it. Thank you. Thank you for listening to my joke.

A delicious dinner was at 7, after which we got a very interesting talk on humpback whales from a lady called Vicky, and so it’s now quite late – at least relative to the 0530 alarm we’ll need if we are to join in tomorrow’s excursion to seek grizzly bears and other fauna. So I hope you’ll excuse me whilst I get to bed to try to get some sleep. Come back tomorrow and find out if we made it.

We discouver Vancouver

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Thursday 18 August 2022 – The disembarkation from Silver Muse was a smooth and well-organised process. We’d expected to be able to disembark at 0945, but actually it was just before 9am when we emerged blinking into the Vancouver cruise terminal.  We picked up our bags and (probably jay-)walked across the road to the Fairmont Waterfront where, as expected, our room wasn’t ready for us yet.  However, quelle surprise!, the application of a few dollars to upgrade got us immediately installed in a nice double aspect room, with one window looking out at the port and the other at Coal Harbour.  The receptionist, François, gave us a lunchtime recommendation, a place called Cardero’s, and generally was very nice, as he should be, having scored a few extra dollars for the hotel.

After a certain amount of sitting around and drawing breath (me) and organising confirmations for our entertainments tomorrow and the day after (Jane), we got the hotel to book us a late lunch at this Cardero’s place and then did what we always do under these circumstances, which is to get out and blunder around the local streets to get a feel for the place.  And by and large, Vancouver has a nice vibe to it.

The first objective was Gastown, the original settlement that became the core of the city of Vancouver, named for “Gassy” Jack Deighton, a Yorkshire seaman, steamboat captain and barkeep who arrived in 1867 to open the area’s first saloon. He was famous for his habit of talking at length (or “gassing”), and the area was designated a national historic site in 2009.  It  is a mix of “hip” contemporary fashion and interior furnishing boutiques, tourist-oriented businesses (generally restricted to Water Street), restaurants, nightclubs and newly upscale housing.

It has statues, like this Angel of Victory, dedicated to the men who perished in the two world wars,

the justly famous Gastown Steam Clock,

quirky shops,

(who knew there were so many musical genres?) and its own Flatiron building

which seems to me to have a multiple snarl on its “face”.  There is also poverty –

this is a public washroom; a couple of police officers we met later suggested that we should have avoided the area, actually. We also saw some homeless people and others who were clearly not well off.  But overall, like all of the areas of Vancouver we wandered through, it’s a pleasant area.

Vancouver has a significant Chinatown, with an impressive gateway

but a useless abacus, as you couldn’t move the counters; and it has real, electric trolleybuses of the sort which were phased out in the UK just before people realised what a good idea they are.

There’s no shortage of interesting buildings

and other notable sights, such as this mosaic referring to the great Vancouver fire of 1886.

We saw one unusual window cleaning exercise in progress

and visited a cathedral (Holy Rosary, Batman!)

and, as we left it, we caught sight of the Lookout Tower

which gave us an idea.

It costs a bit to go up, but the view is great.  For example, you can see from on high how cramped that cathedral is.

Having wandered around the Lookout level, we thought we’d try it on and went up to the revolving restaurant on the level above, to see if they would give us coffee. We were in luck! They were feeling charitable and so we sat whilst we watched Vancouver wag by for an hour.  This is how it looks if you compress that to 45 seconds.

It was then getting towards the time we’d decided on for lunch so we walked along the waterfront to Cardero’s.  It’s a nice walk along the waterfront, past an interesting water feature/fountain thingy,

an art installation called The Drop,

the flight harbour

(the novelty of seeing float planes taking off and landing wears off pretty swiftly here) and the marina at Coal Harbour

which is where you can find Cardero’s.

We were initially served by Ricky Gervais, who is moonlighting over here and has pretty much perfected his Canadian accent.

He is operating under the alias “Travis” but we saw through him.

Seriously, he did a splendid job of making us feel welcome and then handed us over to a colleague, Katy, who also did a fine job.  The food was excellent, as was the general ambience.  I really commend the place to anyone seeking lunch or dinner.  (Our table was booked at 4pm, which is a late lunch for us; by local standards, though, it counts as an early dinner.)

We pottered (tottered?) back to the hotel afterwards, pretty much retracing our steps. The route has a walkway and segregated cycle track, which is a great idea.  We saw some people on one-wheel electric scooters of some kind,

a bush that had grown into a Thing that might have come from the Muppets stable,

and a bizarre shack on stilts.

Who knows what the story is behind that?  It may be an art installation, which would certainly fit in with the generally gentrified vibe of Coal Harbour.

We didn’t exactly retrace our footsteps, because Jane wanted to see the Olympic Cauldron by the convention centre.

It became clear that Something Was Going On there as everyone was dressed in white.

and it was obviously popular as there was a queue,

We discovered later that this was a Diner En Blanc event, the first one staged in Vancouver since 2019.  At the last minute, a secret location is revealed to thousands of people who have all been patiently waiting to learn where “Dîner en Blanc” will take place. Thousands of people then meet for a mass “chic picnic” in a public space. It had a lovely atmosphere.

We got back to the hotel where the delight of finding a kettle in the room was somewhat countered by the horror of discovering that there were no cups.  Jane whistled up room service and asked for large mugs, and milk, so we could have tea, and the nice chap who was helping us brought us some absolutely huge cups – probably normally used for soup, but more than adequate for the job of getting some Twinings Earl Grey into us in suitable quantity,

And that was it for our amble round Vancouver.  Tomorrow will be more structured, as we’ll be carted around in a coach so that we can Do Tourist Things.  Exactly what, you’ll have to come back and find out.