Journey to the Edge: Of Bears and Buggies

It is probably safe to assume that no one comes to Churchill, the polar bear capital of the world, without at least hoping they will get to see one these massive carnivores, and we were no exception.

Peak polar bear season is in October-November, just prior to the ice forming on Hudson's Bay. All the hotels are booked up, the flights and trains en route to Churchill are filled, and seasonal employees come in to help out. It is also a very expensive time to come, which is why we arrived in August instead. Even though peak sighting times are still months away, the bears are still inland, and can still be seen relatively regularly.

Living with the bears requires a constant state of vigilance, as they can wander into town with no fanfare or warning, either up the beach or just down the main road. Two weeks before we arrived, a local man walking with his dog and two children came face to face with a juvenile male (~300 lbs). He kept the bear at bay by whipping it across the snout with his dog leash while interposing himself between it and his children, and simultaneously dialing the 204-675-BEAR hotline so the conservation officers could get down to the beach and tranquilize the beast.

Belinda booked us in on a tundra buggy tour for Thursday morning with a driver named Neil we had met out at Parker's cabin. A nice fella with a quick wit and easy smile, he considers himself a tourist here because he spends the majority of the year at his home in BC, but has taught himself quite a bit about the local flora and fauna over the past few seasons.

The buggies themselves are amazing machines, built right here in Churchill, and are essentially an extra tall (enough to easily stand in), extra wide, 4-wheel drive school bus on monster truck tires, with an open platform built on to the back. After about a 20 minute drive by shuttle bus to the launch point and buggy #17 (which Neil would like to dedicate to Wendell Clark, by the way) we helped him load on the lunch and coffee supplied by the Tundra Inn, and we were on our way.

It is not quiet on the buggy, with the massive diesel engine sitting just under the floorboards aft of the driver's seat. When the prodigious rocking and bucking of the buggy threatened to flip the trap door open, Neil stamped it shut with a cry of "Shut up, Gramma!" While never taking his hands off the wheel.

Neil told us he had seen at least one bear on each trip he'd taken in the last week and a half, but that didn't guarantee we would see one today. It was almost an hour's drive to where he had seen the last one, close to the gutpile left from a hunted caribou. (I asked if it had been hunted or killed by an animal, and he said not only was he sure it was hunted, but he was pretty confident he'd eaten its tongue Saturday night.) Along the way he pointed out several birds and flag trees, and took the buggy across a full-on lake deep enough to crest the windows on a regular car. "The air intakes are at about 4 feet, so I get nervous at about 3 & 1/2," Neil explained.

"Keep an eye out for white rocks," he continued. "If it lifts its head, there is a chance it is a polar bear. It still could be a rock, because we get heat waves sometimes that will totally make it look as though the rock lifted its head, and that can be disappointing."

Not too long after crossing the lake, Neil pointed out a rock sitting besides another small body of water. "That might be him," Neil said, "that gutpile isn't too far from here." Sure enough, the rock got up and began to walk around. Seeing that the bear looked agitated, Neil, turned off the engine for a few minutes to let him get used to our presence, then started up and moved slowly up behind him.

We ended up maybe thirty yards behind the bear as he ate the caribou remnants. He was content to eat with his back to us for the most part, but would occasionally turn his head to gaze at us. We snapped photos furiously, and since the buggy was at less than half capacity, everyone was able to get to a window easily.

While we did this, Neil helpfully unlimbered the lunch containers, dramatically asking, "Hmm, I wonder what sort of soup they gave us today?" as he opened one and the smell of vegetable soup filled the buggy, the drifted out the open windows. It turned out to be a hearty scratch-made vegetable, but it was not enough to entice the bear from his own meal.

Neil put the soup away and brought out the containers full of coffee and hot water, and we drank hot chocolate and 'tundraccinos' for about 20 minutes while the bear went about his business. When he had either eaten his fill or gotten tired of being a spectacle, he laid down for a post meal siesta. He hadn't done a whole lot, but he was the first wild polar bear any of us had seen, so we were thrilled. Anything after this would be a bonus bear.

Neil next took us out east, towards Cape Churchill, and asked Glory if she had her Learner's Permit yet. When she said no, he grinned and said "Me neither! come take the wheel for a bit.". The kids took turns driving the tundra buggy, which is quite a challenge since it takes more than 18 complete revolutions of the truck-style steering wheel to turn from end to end. Happily, there were no incidents during this apprenticeship period, and Glory even had the correct answer to the tourist question Neil popped on her.

Some time after Neil returned to the driver's seat, I saw a suspect-looking white rock out towards the shore of Hudson's Bay. Was that a bit of light showing from beneath the centre of it? "Neil," I asked tentatively, "is that a bear out at about our nine o'clock, by the water?"

Neil peered through his field glasses. "I think it very well may be. Good eyes there." As we drew closer, he sat up straighter and said, "Holy crap, it is, and she's got a seal kill there; you don't see those very often."

"Really?" I asked.
He nodded. "I think I've seen maybe...seven the whole time I've been in Churchill."

As the tundra buggy approached, she became skittish and moved away a little bit, but Neil cut the engine and parked the buggy maybe 30 feet away from the skinless carcass of a good sized ringed seal, and eventually she returned.

This bear was a female, about the same size as the male we had seen earlier, say 600-700 pounds, but sleek and with a full belly that Neil pointed out as the sign of a healthy bear. Since they have no predators besides man, polar bears don't really grow old in the wild, they tend to starve to death instead, which Neil informed us is pretty tragic to watch since he'd had one give out in full view of the buggy one time. Seeing a well-fed female at this time of year, where the animals are pretty much in a state of 'waking hibernation', was a real treat for everyone, including our guide.

The female didn't do a whole lot while we were there, conserving her energy for the most part, but she did pace around a bit, always returning to the seal so the gulls wouldn't try to feed on it. We stayed on-site for over an hour, while Neil unpacked the soup and sandwiches for our lunch. I spent quite a bit of time on the platform watching the bear, snapping photos, and with the wind coming in off the bay, I was grateful for the bowl of hot soup Neil offered me when I came back into the buggy.

After lunch, Neil said he was going to move the buggy a little closer to the seal carcass in order to see what she would do. He brought us to within 6 or 8 feet of the seal, which prompted two behaviours; first, she lumbered around to the front of the buggy and began drinking from a puddle, which Neil said he had never seen, as the bears are thought to get most of their moisture from the blubber of their kills. After she had slaked her thirst, which makes sense when you consider how salty that seal probably was, she grabbed it by the tail and dragged it across the rocks towards the shore, assuming we wouldn't follow her.

After that, it was time to head for home, about an hour's drive as the buggy crawls. It was just as well; sitting down after the excitement of such a close encounter with Canada's apex predator made me realize how tired I was, and despite the bumpy ride, both Fenya and I managed to nod off on the return trip.

Journey to the Edge: Bus Stops

Parker and Belinda arranged for a tour bus to take the eight of us (plus some other guests) on a comprehensive excursion encompassing the townsite and surrounding area. Mark was a fantastic guide: a lifelong Churchillian, affable, knowledgeable, and able to give insights on all manner of topics, from history to biology.

Cape Merry Battery - our first stop was the Cape Merry Battery, an artillery position directly across the river from Fort Prince of Wales. Imagine what it must have been like to sit on this lonely spit of rock two and a half centuries ago, keeping one eye on the lookout for French ships and the other open for polar bears. Combining elements of history and scenery made this an ideal first stop, despite the fact it was about 9 degrees and raining. As a bonus, we got to see lots of beluga whales in the river.

St. Paul's Anglican Church - the neatest feature of this old church is the stained glass, much of which came from the military chapel when they closed the base back in the sixties. The pane featuring Saint Michael, "Captain of the Heavenly Hosts" was donated by the U.S. Strategic Air Command, which seems appropriate, if a little chilling. There is also a window donated by Lady Franklin, in thanks and recognition for those who attempted to find her husband's doomed expedition.

Miss Piggy - back in 1979, a twin engine cargo plane tried to return to the Churchill Airport after noticing a problem shortly after takeoff, but caught its tailwheel on a telephone line, and ended up pancaking on these rocks. The pilot and co-pilot both walked away from the wreck, qualifying it as a good landing. After the avionics were stripped out, the wreck was left in place, since it wasn't in the way of anything, removing it would require a lot of effort and resources.

Boreal Forest - we've all seen trees, but there some neat examples around Churchill, like the 'flag trees' with all the foliage stripped off the northern half of the tree by wind and ice crystals. Or the bendy conifer below.

Canadian Eskimo Dogs - when the government moved much of the Inuit population to the coasts and replaced their dog sleds with snowmobiles, many of their sled dogs were shot to prevent them from going feral. Now, the breed is in danger of becoming extinct, so a local man named Brian has taken a group of 70 pf them as breeding stock, and keeps them out of town, which is a necessity as they are a pretty vocal group. They are extremely friendly though, despite how fierce and lupine some of them look.

Permafrost - out at the Northern Studies Centre, Mark pulled over so we could walk on the squashy muskeg, and found a place where you can remove a few handfuls of peat and actually touch the permafrost beneath, which Mum did. Jerry and I were actually more interested in the rocket motor sticking out of the earth about 20 yards away, a remnant from the days when the Churchill Rocket Research Centre was still in operation. We also spied a ptarmigan on our way back out, which is frightfully hard to do since they are so well camouflaged.

Journey to the Edge: Churchill Townsite

For a remote community of 815 souls, Churchill has more than its share of cultural touchstones and places to eat and drink. After Parker gave us a brief orientation tour, we went to visit the Parks Canada building, which doubles as the train station.

We were too tired to make it through more than one video, even though they were pretty good as Parks Canada films go, but checked out some of the exhibits and artifacts they had on site. The full-scale mock-up of a polar bear den was first rate, as was the model of the Prince of Wales fort, which we hope to visit later in the week. Glory was impressed by the difference in size between her hand and a polar bear paw, while Fenya was intent on displaying the similarities between her bionically enhanced dentition and Canada's largest land predator.

We then made our way to the Eskimo Museum, which has the largest and most impressive collection of Inuit and northern carving and art in the country. I wasn't able to get a good picture of it, but the two tiny figurines made from the carver's own teeth were particularly impressive, if a little offputting. Narwhal tusks, stuffed animals (including a musk ox and a wolf), and Roald Amundsen's chair round out the collection.

If you find yourself looking for lunch in Churchill, most locals will point you to Gypsy's, a modest diner and Portuguese bakery that makes spectacular food. I had a marinated pork tenderloin sandwich served on a Portuguese bun called a Bifana that was absolutely fantastic, but their soups and salads looked really good as well.

In the evening, we ended up at Parker and Belinda's cabin down in 'The Flats', a little ways from the townsite and right next to the Churchill River where the old Cree village used to be. There is no running water, but no better place to end a day with your family and friends and a cold beer. (By the way, if you can get your hands on the lager made by The Farmery in Manitoba, I highly recommend it; brewed in an old fashioned manner by the farmers who grow the barley and hops themselves, it is nothing fancy, but an exceptionally smooth tasty lager, which is not even one of my favourite types.)

Parker has been renovating and building on to the cabin for some time now, and eventually wants to make it into a full fledged home for when he retires from Manitoba Hydro in a few years. He certainly couldn't have picked a better spot, and I am definitely beginning to see some of the appeal of living in such a far flung locale.

Journey to the Edge: The Tundra Inn

The Tundra Inn is the Churchill hotel owned by my cousin Parker and his wife. Even if it wasn't owned by relations, I would love this place.

In remote tourism destinations like this, you tend to run into two types of tourists: the well-off that enjoy slumming in under-serviced regions, distinguished by their high quality yet inappropriate footwear, and your seasoned adventure tourists with their Mountain Equipment Co-Op jackets and who drink out of a camelbak on the16 hour train ride out of Thompson. I like to think we sort of split the difference, what with two of us wearing waterproof hikers, even if the other two are wearing canvas gorram sneakers. We all brought proper rain gear, even if Fenya's wasn't as H2O repellent as we would have liked, so she borrowed Belinda's MEC jacket, but we aren't opposed to getting our feet wet or hands dirty.

The Tundra Inn is kind of like that. It's rustic but well appointed, simple but comfortable; a wonderful mix of heritage and modern conveniences. The main floor lounge has paintings, artifacts (like the rocket tube from the Churchill rocket range), local photographs, but also a computer with internet access for guests.

There is also a showcase with local crafts, including beaded moccasins made by Belinda herself. The sealskin mitts reminded Mum of a pair she used to have, but these cost $350, but seem totally worth it, both in terms of workmanship and warmth.

The halls themselves are decorated with great examples of native style art.

There is a Tundra Pub and dining room across the street (which we are going to tonight) and they also run a Hostel. If you should ever find yourselves in this part of the world, do yourself a favour and stay with Parker and Belinda; they've looked after us remarkably well thus far!