Polar Hide and Polar Seek


7 Day Nature Photo Challenge: Day 1
My friend Barrett of BearHead Photography nominated me for the Nature Photo Challenge. Barrett is an incredible photographer, and intimately in tune with nature. His beautiful work reflects this perfectly. Thanks for the nomination! Let’s see if I am able to keep up with this….the goal is to post one photo for the next seven days, all while nominating a new person each day.

Polar Hide and Polar Seek
Svalbard
Spotting wildlife is never guaranteed. In fact, at times it feels like Mother Nature is actively advising her creatures to hide from me. But every now and then, she surprises you with a scene that goes beyond your wildest dreams. This was the case for these courting polar bears in the high arctic.

On the final full day of my 11 day Svalbard expedition, we sailed to a location not typically known for hosting polar bears. I was sad that, in all likelihood, I had already seen the trip’s last polar bear. But it had been a good trip for bears; with 20 or so sightings around the archipelago, and the weather on this day was great. The low angle polar sun provided perfect photographic conditions. Lots of light, blue sky, and puffy clouds. We manned the zodiacs with the goal of bird photography. I observed these two bears and the agenda quickly shifted….

In this scene, a large adult male bear is following an adult female. The sexual dimorphism between them is striking. But despite his substantial size advantage, the male behaved like a nervous teenager that lacks the courage to ask for a date. The female played it cool. Mostly ignoring him as she sniffed the beach, occasionally giving him a playful glance back. This ballet went on for over 2 hours. These bears had each other’s full attention; my zodiac and I weren’t given a passing glance. At one point the female slipped behind this lichen covered rock, as if to hide from her suitor. With the line of sight on his target temporarily obstructed, he froze in his tracks, and waited for her to reappear. I was able to capture this moment, complete with his reaction.

The famous polar bear warning signs posted in Svalbard have the Norwegian words: “Gjelder hele Svalbard” and the image of a polar bear. Which means “Polar Bears to be found all over Svalbard”. The sweetest words in the Norwegian language!

I was nominated by Barrett Hedges of BearHead, and will nominate my friend and fellow polar bear photographer Jack Cunningham. Jack and I met shooting brown bears in Alaska and have traveled to Churchill for polar bears. Check out his website herehttp://www.jackcunninghamphoto.com/
#challengeonnaturephotography

CHURCHILL 2013

The bear that traps you, is the one you didn’t see.” – Inuit Proverb

This trip was about the polar bears, followed by arctic foxes as the next objective, with a small hope of some auroral activity.  Though expectations for the Northern Lights were low given Churchill 98% November cloud coverage.  The trip produced good results for all three.

Getting there
All things considered, Churchill is moderately easy to reach, given its remote location and being the gateway to the Canadian arctic. It is not as easy to reach as a place like Yellowknife, but the connections from Winnipeg to Churchill on Calm Airlines are frequent, start early and end late.  These convenient timetables allow you to maximize your time there, if you are so inclined. For me, when I go on vacation I tend to squeeze as much as possible out of each PTO day.  The trip to Churchill was probably my most efficient trip to-date in terms of maximizing my efficiency.  I arrived at Winnipeg at midnight, got some sleep, was flying to Churchill first thing in the morning (06:30), and searching for polar bears by 09:00. The return mirrored my arrival in the sense that I left Churchill at 20:00, and had a 06:00 flight out of Winnipeg.

Driving Report on Trip

Rented a Jeep Patriot from Tamarack Rentals.  It gave a solid performance for the most part, but still left room for improvement in important several areas. The first complaint is we couldn’t lock the four-wheel drive differential, even when we disabled the ESP. Which seemly defeats the purpose of having 4-wheel drive.  The windows are small and there isn’t much vertical, which made it difficult to handle large lenses.

  • 1 flat tire, punctured by willow stalk.  We had to use a sledgehammer to dislodge the frozen wheel off the wheel studs.
  • 2 times stuck. The first time we were towed out by the town’s pastor who was passing by (thanks Doug!) and the next time we were well offroad (on a tundra buggy path) and had to dig ourselves out by hand.
  •  Approximately 60 Km road available to explore in this “road locked” region
  • $2.10/liter gas or ~$100 to fill up tank. (expensive for me, normal for Meril)
  • 2: number of 600mm lenses jockeying for space to shoot out the window
  • 6: nights sleeping outside in the car, instead of a hotel room (out of 8 nights total). The ice encrusted interior cabin (our frozen breath) was a pleasure scrap off each morning.

In terms of changing tires in polar bear country, we learned that the important thing to keep in mind when doing this type of activity, is to remain aware of your surroundings.  It is easy to become fixated on the task at hand. Specifically you focus your eyes downwards on the tires and underside of the vehicle.  You want to solve the problem and be on your way, as quickly as possible.  The problem with this approach is that you are often ignoring your surroundings.  In Churchill, this introduces an entirely new level of danger, the land of white bears on white land and white sky.  Constant awareness and guard must be taken to avoid a bear surprise. And they seemingly pop up out of nowhere….

This is why I repeated the following Inuit Proverb over and over in my head:

The bear that traps you, is the one you didn’t see.

Things for next year:
– avalanche shovel (digging out stuck vehicles)
– tow rope
– kitty litter
– radios
– scanner

Northern Lights

[see blog post about the Aurora]