September 23, 2014
Boat Drift #2/Hike
It was a crispy beautiful morning. The sun was shining and it's rays were warming. We brought jackets, but never even put them on. Today we had only one boat. One boat with six passengers with Fraser guiding. As we drove to the place we would enter the river, we had time to ask Fraser questions that had been on our minds. Questions about the valley, the bears, the weather, the Nuxalk people (the regions native Indians), and whatever else hit our minds. We hadn't got much of a chance to talk to Fraser yet during this trip, because doing two boat drift tours a day, he was always on the go. It was nice to finally really meet the man and we had a great conversation with him during the drive. We got on the river and again within minutes a bear (bear #1) came walking out of the brush and began to fish along the river's edge. 
We couldn't really tell, but we assumed it was a female without cubs. The bear didn't have the mass that the obvious larger boars have. It was a real good looking bear. It's kind of neat how each bear has its own distinctive look that can easily be determined from the others. This bear grabbed a fish and ambled on back into the brush. Shortly before this bear left, Fraser pointed out that there was a mother and three cubs (bears #2-#3-#4-#5) down in front of the bear viewing platform, that the provincal park provided. We sat put because they were meandering in our direction upstream. Sure enough they slowly made there way up the river towards us. The mother was tearing at salmon, while the cubs would find one and fight over it. These cubs were very busy and fun to watch. Someone then noticed that upstream from us was another sow and one cub (bears #6-#7). The mother had a salmon and the cub was trying to help her eat it. They didn't stay long and moved up into the parking lot that we came from and disappeared. Just then a big old bear (bear #8) wandered out from the brush. This bear would be the best looking bear we would see this entire trip. He looked to be a big boar in his prime with some years under his belt. Very sure of himself and walking with confidence. He wandered down the far side of the river bank. 
The sow was first to notice him. You could tell by the way she froze and stared at him, that she had some concerns. Her staring caught the attention of the cubs and they soon also noticed this large male heading in there general direction. The bears were now standing in the middle of a shallow section of the river. Mom glanced back at the bank and was obviously choosing her escape route. Seconds later she made a pretty fast paced move for in the opposite direction of the male toward the far bank. The cubs all immediately followed her, knowing this could be a deadly situation. There was a lot of tree bramble in the way of the river bank, and the cubs couldn't climb fast enough and the current washed two of them downstream away from mom and the third cub. Even the cub with mom was having a difficult time exiting the water through the scattered trees. The river had a bend in it and the water dug a deeper channel along the bank in this area. The cub with mom finally got a footing and got on some trees and made a quick exit joining her. She waited a moment and we could see the other two cubs once again in her company as the four of them dissappeared into the brush. The large boar got himself a fish and mosied on back into the brush. Fraser pointed out that there was a small inner stream that exited farther down the river and that we may see the big bear again down there. With all the bears gone, it was time to continue the drifting part. Eight bears and we could still see the van that brought us here. This is proving to be a good day.
We continued to drift downstream. For a while, we didn't see any bears. We did however see seagulls, mergansers and lots of bald eagles. Adult and juvenile eagles were everywhere. In fact, at one point we saw 6 bald eagles in one tree. I think Fraser said that was the most he'd ever seen in one tree. Nice, we just broke a record. In fact this would be a day record breaking. As we were going around one of the shallow turns, Fraser dropped an oar into the water. 
Another record, he said in ten years, first time he'd ever dropped an oar. This day is definitely special. While we were staring at all the eagles, someone noticed more bears. A sow and three cubs bear #9-#10-#11#-#12) were upriver from us fishing. Fraser rowed us up a little so we could watch them. The sow was far out into the water as the cubs watched from the bank. Then another sow and two cubs (bears #13-#14-#15) approached from the other bank. The second sow swam across the river to the same bank as the first bears, but in a different area. The cubs followed and they disappeared into the brush. We watched the first group till they too disappeared.
At this point I was personally completely satisfied with the grizzly bear sightings. Some people don't see one bear. I wasn't sure how this day could come to some kind of grand finale, but of course it did. As we were getting closer to the end of the trip, out stepped a HUGE old tattered boar (bear #16). Fraser immediately recognized the bear and immediately motioned to his his father, who was in another boat, that this was old "bent ear". He did this by bending his own ear. We were told that he grew up on this river when his mother brought HIM here as a cub. He's one of the few boars that shows up faithfully year after year. Recently the local Nuxalk natives killed a bear that was in town, and Fraser was worried it might have been bent ear, but here he was giving his first debut of the year. "Bent Ear" carried with him scares from years of fighting for mating rights. His one ear was damaged and bent thus giving him his name. 
His lip had obviously been torn and healed badly as it hung out of place. He was a bear that demanded respect and you couldn't help but give it to him. He stepped from the brush and walked passed us and headed out into the middle of the river where he started to fish. He pulled various salmon from the depths and ate the parts he favored. We watched him as he watch back at us. Beautiful bear. Truly ruler of his domain. We watched till he too wandered into the brush. Amazing. That was a great ending to a great day. Sixteen grizzly bears in one small drift down the river. This far exceeded any expectation I could have ever had of seeing bears. We spent a lot of money to get here to see bears and now it was worth every penny. Thank You Fraser AND thank you bears.
After the drift tour it was back to the lodge to get some lunch and rest a little before heading out for a hike. For our afternoon follies, we decided to take another hike. We chose the Lost Lake hike. Lost Lake was a small lake on the hillside of Saloompt Peak. It was quite a hike up, but the views were beautiful at the top. I had a little more energy than Sue, so I did a little extra looking about. I hiked to the back of the lake to look around. There was some old overnight campsites back there, but they were long past their useable days.
Boat DriftLost Lake Hike
