My Blog

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An ever-present cool fog mist fills the air coating everything with needlepoint fine beads of water. It is a calm morning at low-tide, not much stirring apart from a few speedy Bonaparte gulls precisely dive-bombing into the shallow rapids for a loose salmon egg awash in the current. Terminating at the ocean, this Coastal mountain estuary stream is framed tightly on both sides by 1500 ft grey granite walls, scraped ruggedly by the advancing and retreating glaciers of the past. Fir and spruce grow on the shear cliff faces clinging to the granite wherever a ledge presents itself. In front of the granite are towering large growth firs and spruce embedded along the shores and in front of that are groves of shrubby deciduous coastal mountain crab apple bushes with their dime-sized fruit ripe for the picking. Wispy low clouds drift very slowly about half way up the granite walls, carried by the ever-present cool breeze that blows across the melting source water glacier. The sunlight that diffuses through the mist onto the cliff face bursts into a thousand shades of green. I count 19 Bald Eagles; their white heads make them easy to see perching high in the fir trees above me. Everything is seemingly awaiting higher tide and the next run of salmon up the creek.

The smell of rotting death fills the air. Dozens of dead and almost dead salmon drift by in the current having completed their cycle of life that requires them to return from the ocean to the creek of their birth, swim up the rapids, spawn and then die. The banks of the creek are littered with rotting salmon carcass and conditions are so plentiful that even the ravens are choosy awaiting in the tree tops for fresher prey to come up from the ocean. Our guides from the Xai’Xais First Nation (pronounced Hey-Heys) have set us here awaiting grizzly bears. It is only minutes later that a young adult male appears out of the crab apples to fish in the pool only a few hundred feet from where we sit on the bank. Holding his head above water he walks slowly downstream toward us. His eyes are mostly focused into the pool, every so often lifting his nose to the air checking for signs of other male grizzly bears. I can smell nothing but fish, but he knows we are on the bank. With a surprising quickness he lurches forward into the water snatching a 10-pound salmon in his jaws then walks it to the rocky shore, tears open the belly and licks out the roe for breakfast. Moments later, the favorite parts of the salmon devoured, the young bear is walking in the rapids in front of where we sit. I can hear my First Nations guide Heather speaking in hushed tone slowly and calmly to the grizzly bear, telling it we mean it no harm. Through the rapids the bear dives into the downstream pool and very quickly fishes out another healthy salmon. 

Located on the west coast of Canada approximately half way between Vancouver British Columbia and Anchorage Alaska, The Great Bear Rainforest is the largest intact temperate rain-forest in the world. From Vancouver it is two flights to Bella Bella then a two-hour boat trip to Klemtu. It is worth it. The marine life viewing is immediate: breaching humpback whales, dolphins, orcas, sea lions, sea otters, seals and salmon. Once in Klemtu, the heart of the Rainforest viewing begins: countless grizzly and black bears, dozens of bird varieties, Sitka deer, mountain goats, cougars, elk, and coastal gray wolves. But without a doubt its most celebrated resident is the Kermode bear or spirit bear, as it is the only place in the world where you can see one. This rare white bear is a subspecies of the black bear with a recessive gene that gives one in ten of them a creamy white coat. Once almost hunted to extinction, it is a bear surrounded in legend and mystery. With less than 375 Kermode bears estimated in the wild a sighting of one is far from guaranteed.

Anchored in deeper water, a short zodiac ride from the mouth of the estuary, is the main transport boat and our captain, Kitasoo/Xai’Xais Hereditary Chief Charlie Mason. Charlie who is in his late 50s is an imposing figure, a large man with huge hands whose weather worn face holds witness to his life in the outdoors. Proud, yet humble, respectful and soft spoken; as Hereditary Chief he is the keeper of his people’s oral history and spiritual leader of the Raven clans. “Wee’get, the Raven, the creator, wished to leave a reminder for all time that once the land was white with ice and snow and glaciers. Wee’get went among the black bears and every tenth one he made white and decreed that they would never leave the land for here they could live in peace forever to remind us all of the snow.” Charlie’s stories are mystical spirit-filled tales intended to leave the listener with a moral or lesson. He speaks in the first person on the significance of the Spirit Bear, the salmon, the whales and the Raven to Kitasoo/Xai’Xais culture. He even speaks about the legendary Sasquatch, the Bigfoot of the coastal mountains which is significant in Xai’Xais story telling. But perhaps most memorably he tells his own story of how a Spirit Bear came to Klemtu on the day the community opened their new big house. The new big house is a replica of Dis’ju which was the ancient big house so sacred that only a few tourists are given permission to visit. Charlie’s mother was instrumental in the new Big House. “She passed on before the big house was completed,” Charlie told me. “But during the celebration for its opening a white Spirit Bear swam from Cone Island across to Klemtu”. Spirit bears are notoriously shy and for one to swim into Klemtu is a very rare event. Charlie believes “The White Bear was my mother who came to look at the big house and give her blessing to the building.”

Everyone is welcome to visit the spectacular cedar Big House in Klemtu, but it was a thrill that my request was granted as one of only 8 non-indigenous groups allowed to visit the well-hidden remains of Dis’ju in 2018. During colonial times and up to the late 1970’s the Kitasoo/Xai’Xais people were forbidden to worship in traditional ways but they would secretly gather to potlatch at the well hidden and distant Dis’ju. My zodiac lands on a beautiful white sand beach, reminiscent of a Hawaiian beach. I stare out at the still waters of the inside passage and try to understand how this sheltered inlet could possibly ever have enough surf to create a fine sand beach, I still have no explanation. The trail into the thick rain-forest is not apparent from the beach but the two young Xai’Xais guides know where to go. Pushing through thick firs and underbrush we are greeted by the caws of two black Ravens announcing to the forest our arrival as we emerge into the remains of the moss covered Dis’ju Big-house. Heather tells stories of the origin of the Xai’Xais first Big House and the significance of Potlatch and points out the features of what is left of the ancient construction.

The Raven magic would continue the next day while sitting perched perfectly in a rocky ledge above a very steep series of water falls where the salmon are expending every ounce of energy attempting to jump up to the pools above. There are remains of salmon kills strewn everywhere on the rocks, however we wait for most of this day without a bear sighting. Just before it was time to hike back out to the zodiac a large black Raven appears perched high above in a massive fir tree. His caws sound to me like laughter as if he is mocking me for this wasted day. As I raise my camera to focus a picture on him he swoops downward out of the tree guiding my eye down to the pool above the upper falls. There it is, standing at the top of the falls…a large white Spirit bear fishing right in front of us! Staying well past our agreed to time, we would leave the rocky perch before the Spirit bear did, even so, spending a good 45 minutes capturing dozens of photos of the shy white bear fishing in late day light.

Hiking out to the zodiac I hear the caws of the Raven behind me. I stop to find him perched high in the firs, “Thank you Wee’get for sharing your homeland with me” I find myself saying. I continue to climb out over the rocks stopping again, smiling while asking “Wee’get, can you find me Charlie’s Sasquatch?” and my smile got bigger, as this time, eyes scanning the fir tops, the Raven was gone.