Canoona River, Khutze Inlet

It turns out that last night the aurora borealis made an appearance above us. Several of the cooks came in asking if we had seen it. We all gritted our teeth and said no, we were busy sleeping, including me.


Doug Neasloss is our guide today. Doug is one of the elders of the Kitasoo/Xai’xais, he is one of the founders of the Spirit Bear Lodge, a member of the Spirit Bear Research Foundation and an accomplished photographer. I really enjoyed talking with him learning all the things that are going on in the GBR and the implications of all the outside forces pushing against it.

Canoona River

Today the ride to the Canoona River is clear, no fog and very few clouds. The weather forecast for the next day is for clouds to move in and rain to follow in a few days. We have been very fortunate with the weather this week. Normally October experiences 25 days of clouds with almost that many days with rain. The rainforest area averages over 118” of rain a year, almost 10’! Here in NM we have been in a drought and haven’t seen 8” in a year for the past couple of years.

We hike along the river and stop for at least 45 minutes to over an hour in three different spots to watch for bears. No bears are seen; several of us have been watching the river and haven’t seen any salmon either. I think the 2012 salmon run has finished, and the bears have moved to other sources of food.

I had to include the 'tourist' photo of me to show that I was actually at the Great Bear Rainforest.  I'm in my rain jacket although I didn't need it.

This afternoon we’ll move over to the Khutze Inlet looking for grizzlies. Once we arrive we see a mother and cub digging the estuary looking for roots. Mom can tell something has changed with our arrival but we stay low and quiet so mom goes back to digging.  We give her a wide berth and walk up along the river.

Doug tells us that several hundred years ago this area used to have a village of several thousand inhabitants. There are several orchards of crabapple trees farther upstream along with remnants of a village. The valley is spectacular with waterfalls and snow topped mountains.

The tide moves quickly in this area, rising several inches every few minutes, overall tide levels vary up to 10’ between low and high tide. What had been a clear path 15 minutes ago we have to bypass because the water level has risen above the path.

On our way back we see more humpback whales swimming.

Tonight we will celebrate Thanksgiving in Canada, so this year I will get to celebrate Thanksgiving twice. When I was in Vancouver I saw signs advertising a Thanksgiving buffet at the hotel but thought “They sure are advertising Thanksgiving early here. It’s about as bad as the Americans advertising for Christmas before Halloween”. Then I noticed that Thanksgiving is on Oct 8th. One must pay attention.

We ate with the elders of the Kitasoo/Xai’xais nation, we heard stories of where they came from and how the village of Klemtu is progressing and growing. They had many nice things to say about Tim, the manager of the Spirit Bear Lodge. They really love him and the work he is doing with the Lodge.

After dinner I packed up most of my stuff. I have to leave out my camera and tripod, I’m getting up at midnight to see the aurora, if it’s there.

Thank you for stopping by,
Mark