In July 2007 I spent five days on the Katmai coast of Alaska on a Natural Habitat expedition to photograph the brown bears and landscape of this stunning unspoilt wilderness. Katmai National Monument was created in 1918 after the eruption of Novarupta in 1912, the most violent volcanic event of the 20th Century. The area has been a National Park & Preserve since 1980, an area of over three and a half million acres remaining almost entirely free of the influence of man for almost a hundred years.

The ash disgorged from Novarupta totally reset the original grassland ecology of the area. Colonisation by alder trees and subsequent nitrogen fixation allowed development of the diverse mix of plants and animals present today. The large tidal range of the Shelikof Strait and the rivers flowing down from the mountain glaciers form a coastal landscape of tidal flats and lagoons which form an ideal habitat for the Alaskan brown bear. Today the area is famed for large numbers of these magnificent animals who grow large on the abundance of salmon running the rivers, clams on the beaches and the protein rich sedges and other salt tolerant plants growing in the tidal lagoons. 

Katmai has no roads and the only practical way of getting there is by air. After all standing on the scales and having our gear weighed we took off for the one hour floatplane trip from Kodiak. We landed on the edge of the Shelikof Strait at Swikshak, very interesting with a two foot swell running, though I've had worse landings on 747's at airports. The plane was met by the aluminium skiff from F/V Susitna, our home for the next five days. Susitna is an Alaskan crab boat, originally built to fish the Bering Sea, but now converted as a floating base for exploring the Katmai coast by John Rogers of Katmai Coastal Bear Tours.

Crab boats have large water filled storage tanks below decks for keeping the catch alive, making Susitna a very stable and comfortable base. Our guide Brad Josephs and the Susitna's crew of Peter, Colin and Carrie the cook made us very welcome and continued to look after us wonderfully during the trip. Carrie's cooking was fantastic, producing gourmet food from the small galley at whatever time of day or night we returned from photographing the bears.

The first afternoon after getting off the floatplane set the pattern for the rest of the week. We had only a short time to sort our gear and pack cameras and lenses into dry-bags before we got togged out in thigh boots and lifejackets for the run ashore. On this part of the coast between Swikshak and Kukak Bay the tidal range means that skiff landings either mean negotiating the surf at the high tide line or landing hundreds of yards offshore and wading across the tidal flats to the shoreline.

During our time in Katmai we were incredibly lucky with the weather. In the summer this part of Alaska frequently sees low cloud and rain with high winds; not the best conditions for boat landings or photography. We did have one day of rain and wind which we spent in the sheltered anchorage at Kukak Bay, but for the rest of the time we had wonderful conditions for photograpy; clear skies in the early morning and evening with just enough cloud through the day to soften the light.

The bears of Katmai (Ursus arctos) are correctly referred to as brown bears, they are the same species as inland and mountain bears which are known as grizzly bears (for their grizzled fur, not their nature). This distinction in naming reflects the unique habitat of coastal Katmai which provides the brown bears with a very rich food supply, allowing the bears to grow much larger than inland bears. Female bears (sows) grow to over 700 lbs and males (boars) can get to 1700lbs or more. This rich habitat supports a much higher density of bears than typical upland grizzly territory, making Katmai probably the best place in the world to come and photograph these magnificent and charismatic animals.

    Loading up the Andrew Airways Beaver floatplane at Kodiak seaplane port ready for the flight to Katmai 

   Brad Josephs leading the way ashore from the skiff at Hallo Bay for a morning photographing fishing bears