Lake Clark was all about bears. We saw 13 that afternoon. Tom Light and I flew from Homer, AK, in a sea plane (which was super cool all by itself) to vast salt water “flats” at the southern edge of Lake Clark. There is no access to this National Park except by plane or boat. The plane landed at a basecamp where we transferred to an airboat, like you see in the Florida Everglades. In fact this one was made in Florida and when we were at Lake Clark it was one of only two airboats in Alaska. The airboat sat two rows of 5 each and Tom and I were on the front. The operator would skim over the water and then cut the engine to wait as he knew the bears’ patterns and we would sit quietly as they approached. Not quite the thrill of Katmai National Park where we walked among the bears but close. A highlight for me was the young cub, six months old, with his mom. He was chasing birds and captured a large stick that he played with for 15 minutes. Also at one point another bear charged our boat but stopped - as the guide said he would - about 30 feet away. Still a bit of excitement for sure. We watched three of them move toward us but one caught a fish and ate it less than 25 feet from the boat. I also spotted three new birds for my life list and that was cool as well. We were in the airboat for about 2 hours and it took nearly an hour each way in the air from Homer. Note the photo of the old, rusty crane. There is a lot of abandoned equipment in Alaska because it is too expensive to remove it and the mud will slowly engulf the whole machine.
Great experience and worth the steep price.
This last photo is what many of the memories of Alaska represent. Bears, we saw about 35 grizzlies, mountains, water and small planes. A wonderland.
