One of the adventures we were excited about on our recent trip to Alaska was the bearwatching excursion. I had never seen a wild bear and this trip offered a chance to watch Coastal brown bears feeding. Before we left I studied up on the differences between black bears and brown bears (it’s not about color) and what to do in an encounter. I’m sure I would have remembered all my lessons in the midst of being attacked by a bear!
We got up early, making it to the airport by 6:30 AM. We climbed into the tiny 6-passenger plane. We took off from Juneau and landed 20 minutes later in the tiny town of Hoonah. We saw the bear excursion van waiting for us even before we got off the plane. As soon as I saw the sign the guide was holding, I knew we were in trouble. It said “Bear Search“. We all thought we were going on a Bear Watch, not a Bear Search!
The tour was riding in a van for 3 hours looking for bears and hoping that one crosses the road in front of us. We saw a lot of bear poop, some tracks, and even a shrew, but no bears. It wasn’t what we expected.
The next day was our long whale watch adventure. We booked a custom, private tour so we could spend more time on the water watching whales. Shortly after motoring out of the harbor, the captain told us that we may have to choose between killer whales (orcas) and a huge group of lunge-feeding humpback whales. Tough decision, but we went with the humpbacks because there was a small chance we’d see orcas too.
Sure enough, a few minutes later the captain got word of orcas in the area. Seconds after she told us to look for them, a huge male popped up in front of our boat! This was not what we expected!
We stayed with these whales for a few minutes, then our captain (Jayleen) said that the weather was getting a little rough, but if we were all up for it, she’d try to make it to the lunge-feeders. Bubble-net lunge-feeding is a cooperative form of feeding where the whales swim in a circle around massive schools of fish, blowing bubbles as they go. As the bubbles rise a “net” forms around the fish, condensing them into a tight ball. The whales then lunge through the group of fish with their mouths wide open, engulfing fish and water. They then close their mouths and force the water out through their baleen plates (picture straining water through a comb) and swallow the fish left behind. This phenomenon is rare, only occurring in a few places on Earth.
We wanted to witness it. On the way to the bubble-netters, the weather held up for us. Jayleen continued to prepare us for disappointment, saying we may need to turn around and go home. About an hour later, when we were in the area they had been spotted, we slowed down and looked around. Just then, a spectacle that I had never seen before happened: ten whales broke the surface of the water with their mouths open. This was not what we expected!
Humpback whales bubble-net feeding, near Juneau Alaska. Photo by Jamie Keeven When was the last time the unexpected happened to you?
