I saw my first polar bear about 15 minutes after arriving at the airport in Churchill, Manitoba. About 100 feet off the side of the road, the largest four-legged predator in the world stood on the tundra, sniffing the air nonchalantly. Any sense of reserve I had evaporated in a burst of childlike excitement. “Polar bear! Polar bear! It’s as big as a horse!”
Diane Howell, the driver of the Chevy Suburban I was riding in, gave a bored shrug. “That? That’s not even a big one. We’ve got a couple hanging around the compound that weigh over 1,000 pounds.”
My enthusiasm was only slightly dampened because she estimated the bear was a “700-pounder,” which actually is as big as a small horse. I had been in Churchill 15 minutes and had already seen what I came to see: Ursus maritimus, the bear of the sea.
Polar bears are as reliable an indicator of late fall in Churchill as falling leaves are in places farther south (which is a good thing, because there are no trees in Churchill; it’s where the tundra begins). Churchill is uniquely situated at the center of the southernmost population of polar bears in the world. Because of its location at midcontinent, weather patterns bring arctic conditions to the town, which is roughly at the same latitude as Copenhagen, Denmark. For polar bears, the colder the better: They need ice to survive.
For thousands of years, the bears have gathered in October on the shore of Hudson Bay where the Churchill River empties into the sea. They wait for the day when the ice solidifies so that they can head to sea and start hunting ringed seals after a long, hungry summer. Out on the barren, scrubby shoreline, they socialize, they wrestle, they take naps in snowdrifts. And, like it or not, they pose for photos.
There are an estimated 800-1,000 polar bears in the Hudson Bay population. These days, the tourists migrating to Churchill outnumber the bears of the region about 10 to 1.
During the six-week bear season, two companies operate a total of 19 “tundra buggies” – a cross between a monster truck and a school bus. The buggies ferry those 10,000 visitors onto the tundra just a few miles from town, where they can see bears up close and in relative safety.
I had signed up for a six-night stay at the Churchill Northern Studies Centre, a nonprofit scientific research station that raises funds by operating learning vacations about the sub-Arctic environment. Each year there are sessions on beluga whales, wildflowers, birds and polar bears, the most popular residents.
Howell, the assistant director, delivered me to the center’s compound of corrugated iron buildings, centered on a decrepit, tilted rocket launch tower. “This used to be a rocket range for the Canadian NASA,” she said. “When the government retired it, we bought the buildings for a dollar.”
The other nine members of my group already had gathered in the homey dining room, where we were assembled to get a course outline and to learn the rules about bear safety.
The bear biologist leading the course, Scottish scientist Rupert Pilkington, said that first and foremost we must not go outside unless in a group, and if at all possible with an armed guard. He wasn’t joking.
Unlike other bears, he said, polar bears are pure hunters, and 95 percent of their diet is made up of fresh meat – preferably the ringed seals they hunt on the ice, but to a polar bear, people are meat too.
“It’s very tempting to anthropomorphize them,” Pilkington said. “They’re very charismatic. But they are dangerous. The station is in the middle of the bear movement area. This is their territory, and we must respect it.”
That idea was underlined by the news that a week earlier a polar bear had torn a hole in an outside wall leading to the storeroom next to the kitchen we were sitting in.
“He got into a deep freeze and helped himself to the bacon, a bag of sausages and a 10-pound box of date high-fiber bars,” Pilkington said. “We did learn one thing from the experience. Polar bears don’t like tofu. He bit into a package and then spit it out.”
This tale was sobering. We were there to see polar bears, and knowing that they might come looking for us upped the ante a bit. Pilkington told us not to worry. The wall had been repaired, and the marauding animal had been incarcerated at Churchill’s famous bear jail, where recalcitrant bruins are held until they can be helicoptered out to more remote tundra.
The intimacy of close quarters
When the ice forms, the bears leave town, Pilkington said. Once seals are available, date bars and sausages lose their appeal, apparently.
Pilkington told us we would balance our time between lectures and field trips, with two days scheduled in tundra buggies for bear observation. Most organized polar bear tours in Churchill cost $3,000-$4,000 Canadian ($2,580- $3,440 U.S.); the bear trips at the Northern Studies Center cost about $2,000 ($1,720 U.S.).
With the lower price comes some rusticity. We slept three and four to a room in men’s and women’s dorm rooms with bunk beds. We had a sign-up sheet and each took turns washing dishes for two or three meals, and we shared group bathrooms.
The forced intimacy created a comfortable degree of camaraderie and was a small price to pay for getting an insider’s perspective on fieldwork. The staff at the center included scientists doing research on global climate change, among other things.
The next day, a tundra buggy pulled up at 8:45 a.m. Swaddled in multiple layers of wool, fleece and Gore-Tex, we climbed aboard. The inside was laid out like a school bus but with a wider walkway down the center. At the back of the buggy, near the bathroom, a propane heating stove radiated warmth. The buggy had a back door and an outdoor porch that was big enough to hold 15 people.
It took about 45 minutes, rumbling over the bumpy roads and through slushy puddles, to arrive at our first bear encounter. The driver spotted a bear sleeping in a snowdrift on the shore of a frozen pond. We crowded around the windows breathlessly.
I headed out onto the porch, into the howling wind. It was about 20 degrees, warm for this part of the world. The clouds hung low and leaden. The land stretched away without hills or any other form of relief in any direction. The bear looked tiny and fragile compared with the vast and empty plain around him.
Snowy gladiators
“The Russians call this the ‘taiga,”‘ Pilkington said. “The land of little sticks.” He explained that just a few miles south, the boreal forest begins.
During the summer, the bears spend as much time as possible in the shade of those stunted tamarack and spruce trees. They overheat easily in temperatures above freezing. Female polar bears would be there too, in dens carved into the peat and soil, nursing their cubs.
“For the months when the ice is out, the polar bears are in ‘walking hibernation,”‘ Pilkington said. “It’s not true hibernation, but their metabolism slows down and they live on their fat reserves until the ice returns. Right now they’re very hungry and anxious to get hunting.”
This particular bear generated oohs and aahs when he sleepily stood up, stretched, rolled on the ice, and then strolled over to sniff our tires. He stood on his back legs briefly to get a closer look at those of us standing on the outdoor porch, and then moved on.
We moved on too. The tundra buggies are allowed to rove over the 49-square-mile area that used to be part of the military installation and rocket range. South of that is Wapusk National Park, with more extensive protections.
During the course of the five-day stay at the center, we learned more than we ever thought we would know about polar bears. They are perfectly designed to hunt on the ice.
A few facts: Their skin is black and their white fur operates like optical cable, directing sunlight to that black skin for warmth. They live 20-25 years. Almost no heat escapes their bodies; an infrared photo of a polar bear shows tiny blips around the eyes and nose, and that’s about it. Polar bears make almost no noise; they clack their teeth or make a short “chuffing” noise right before attacking. They can swim dozens of miles in icy water with no ill effects.
We took a helicopter and saw from above a moose and a mother polar bear with cubs. We went dog sledding one day, and spent another day in Churchill shopping. (There are few stores, but if you want a fur hat or incredible Inuit art, you’ll be pleased.)
One night after dinner, the Northern Lights lit up the night sky in a blaze of flickering green flames. They flowed from north to south, and lit up the snow around the compound with an eerie glow.
But the highlight came at the end of the first day in the tundra buggy. It was about 3:30 p.m., and the season-shortened day was coming to a close. It had been cloudy all day. For about a half hour, we had been parked by two young male polar bears, sleeping together about 30 feet from the back of the truck.
Dyck told us they might be brothers, but that in any case, during the fall, the bears are not competing for food or mates, and young males tend to hang out together. Sometimes they spar or play-wrestle, training for the serious battles to come during mating time.
I already had a lot of pictures of sleeping bears, and I was getting ready to put my camera away when these two started nosing each other, and then wrestling on the ground. Suddenly the sun broke through the clouds, throwing golden light over the snow, the stunted red willows and the ivory-furred bears.
Then the bears stood up and sparred. It was like boxing, or dancing. They stepped back and forth, facing each other with jaws opened, then charged forward, grappling with massive arms wrapped around each other. One would gain advantage, throw the other down, and the dance would begin again.
For 20 minutes, they wrestled, not making a sound. At this distance, I could see how big they really were. These two were standing 8 or 9 feet tall. They were just playing, but they were graceful and fast and immensely strong. Willow branches and snow flew as they fought.
As Rupert Pilkington said, polar bears are so charismatic and appealing, it’s easy to underestimate their sheer physical power and core nature as top predators. Here, as they stood and exchanged blows, even in play, it was clear we were among the true lords of the Arctic.
The details
The good news is, Churchill is the most accessible destination for polar bear watching in the world. The bad news is, it’s still not very accessible.
Winnipeg, the capital and biggest city in Manitoba, is the gateway to Churchill, 660 miles north. Two small airlines serve Churchill’s airport: Calm Air and Kivalliq. Round-trip tickets cost about $1,200 Canadian ($932 U.S.).
Because the weather conditions are so variable (on the day I left, it was 15 below zero Fahrenheit with sustained 40-mph winds), air service can be unpredictable. If you’re a nervous planner, give yourself an extra day to get there and get back. My flight to Churchill was on time, but it took an extra day to get home.
Book well in advance. During polar bear season (typically October and the first few weeks of November), the flights are often full. For flights: 800-839-2256 or calmair.com, and 877-855-1500 or kivalliqair.com.
The two companies that own the vehicles – Tundra Buggy and Great White Bear Tours – offer longer tours and hire out their equipment and drivers to the other organizations that run bear tours. For next year’s rates and schedules, contact Tundra Buggy at 204-949-2050 or tundrabuggy.com, and Great White Bear Tours at 204-675-2781 or greatwhitebeartours.com.
The Churchill Northern Studies Centre will conduct five polar bear learning vacations weekly Oct. 14 through Nov. 16. Three of them are reserved for the Elderhostel program and can be booked through Elderhostel, 877-426-8056 or elderhostel.org. Two are run through the center, 204-675-2307 or churchillmb.net~cnsc.
Churchill, a town of 600, has a day’s worth of sights to see. A day-long visit is included in the Northern Studies Centre’s programs. At the top of the list is the Eskimo Museum, which has one of the most important collections of Inuit art in the world. The collection includes walrus-tusk panel carvings depicting daily life, soapstone sculpture and handmade sealskin kayaks.
Churchill’s Town Centre Complex is a unique adaptation to the sub-Arctic environment. The sprawling building along the shore of Hudson Bay contains Churchill’s public school, city library, government offices, hospital, indoor playground and a few fast-food eateries. It’s worth a visit just to see the extensive collection of felt wall-hangings made by Inuit artists in Nunavut.
