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| View from the plane on the way to Silver Salmon Creek Lodge |
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| Can bears read? |
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| One of the 2 year old cubs |
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| A loving nap |
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| Us and the bears |
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| Don't ya just love my paws? |
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| Mom looking serious |
Well we could not have asked for a finer way to start the adventure. We showed up at the Lake Hood airport right on time, got weighed in with all of our gear and we were off. We had originally thought it was a float plane ride, but we took off on a runway. The pilot informed us that flying time would be about an hour.
We had low expectations because all weather forecasts were for rain, in fact for rain all week.....but in Warren's world, one never knows what may happen. It wasn't raining in
Anchorage, so that was a start. We met up with 2 others who were headed to Silver
Salmon Creek Lodge too. Ruth and Karl from
Switzerland. We'd later find out they are magic too!!
As the flight progressed we were more and more amazed...no rain! Not only no rain, but sun! We all snapped away at the magnificent scenery as it went by...glaciers, mountains, waterfalls.
As we began to circle for the landing we began go see bears!! Then as we were getting closer and closer to the water and wondering where on earth we were landing without pontoons....we landed on the beach! We jumped out and shot our first bear! What a welcome!
Dave, our guide, grabbed the gear and we were off to get settled in, get our bear brief and then we would be out. We we given 'Halibut Hut'... Fabulous one room cabin. Silver Salmon Creek Lodge is all it says it is and MORE!! The staff, the food, the accommodations and of course the bears are the REAL DEAL!!! We loved every minute of our time at the lodge.
Our first bear encounter was a mother with two 2-year old cubs. Oh what fun it was to watch them in action. Seems that the twins think the best thing on earth is playing with one another, closely followed by sipping mothers milk! Yes - they eat grass, but once in a while they still get a taste of the sweet stuff. And we were lucky enough to get a chance to see them get a taste!
We came back for tasty lunch and before we knew it, it was time to go out again. The afternoon started a bit slow, but then we encountered a bear near the river and we were able to spend about an hour with it. It walked around, swam, hung out near a bear sign and generally gave us a great show. The sun is completely out as I write this blog; a very rare occurrence here!
Both John and Cheri filled their 32G cards and so we are back at camp, downloading and awaiting dinner. That's around 1,000 pictures each!
Dinner was delicious- a theme that would repeat! Then as soon as we were done...zoom..off we went again. This time we we treated to a bear on the beach - up close and personal! Then it was the Mom with her twin two year old's! What a time we had shooting them for over an hour in the magic sunlight golden hour!
Then we fell into bed and fast asleep.
Enjoy!
John & Cheri
