June 18

Here I am, on my 5^th trip to Alaska, and the only bears I have seen were from the air, and one last year in Denali. Linda has lived in Alaska for 16 years and never seen a bear. The kids have been here all their lives and never seen bears! Isn’t Alaska supposed to be wrapped up with bears? Well, it was time to find out. The man with the plan (and the airplane) was Tim Pope of Natron Air. He is one of Eric’s tax clients and an all-around good guy. He operates a GA8 Airvan out of the Soldotna airport, running freight and passengers on hunting, fishing, and sightseeing trips. He said he knew where the bears were.

As I drove up to Natron’s office, a good-sized boxer walked up and parked himself right outside of the driver’s door. Not barking, not wagging his tail, just standing there. Great. No way to tell what his intentions were without getting out… Turns out that AJ was pretty friendly, and at 13, too tired to bite much of anything that didn’t come in a dish.

Bryce and AJ

Tim Pope, Natron Air

Tim flew us over Cook Inlet to Chinitna Bay where we landed on a gravel beach. He led us off the beach, through a stand of trees, to a grassy plain that had a stream running through it. There were bears here. A yearling grazed about 30 yards away from us, on the far bank of the stream. Scattered out through the grass were quite a few other bears, many with cubs. Tim counted 20, and said the most he had ever seen here was 34.

This bear had an appetite for grass, not people, and pretty well ignored us. But when he walked up to the creek for a drink, Tim said "If he crosses that creek, we are OUTA HERE!"

Bear on the far creek bank, to the right of Lana.

All the comforts of home.

We watched bears for about 20 minutes, then walked back to the plane and flew over a glacier, then out over the Drift River floodplain, where we saw seals stacked up on the mudflats like cordwood, as well as swans and a moose. Then back across the Inlet, where we saw some caribou bedded down in a field. The whole flight lasted about three hours and was worth every penny.

Back at the house, we had burgers for lunch, then Lana, Mom, and I took the RV to Homer for a night on our own. Mom got to see her first moose up close, right outside of Ninilchick.

When we got to Homer, we found a place to park in a public lot down on the Spit where it looked like it was OK to camp. We set up and walked around the Spit.

I saw two guys on KLR's and went over to talk. They were from Redding, California, and had ridden all the way up to Inuvik, in the Northwest Territories. They were having a ball.

One the way back to the RV, the parking lot had cleared out a little, and I noticed this sign:

So we moved. There was a city park that allowed camping a bit to the north, no hookups, but a waterfront spot was only $15. We pulled in next to a couple of drunk guys from South Dakota who were up here halibut fishing. Dinner was pasta and a bottle of red wine.