Exploring Wide Bay in Alaska's Ugashik Wildlife Refuge

On our afternoon hike, this bear family came running across the tundra. They crossed our path down in this marshy valley, gave us a hard look, then continued up the far side of the valley. I loved how they looked like soldiers in this photo, checking and protecting from all sides.

Wide Bay is a huge bay along the Alaskan Peninsula west of Katmai National Park. It is part of the Alaska Peninsula Ugashik Refuge. There are very few visitors here, as it is a remote, hard to get to part of Alaska. I am quite lucky to be aboard the Safari Explorer, an expedition ship built for traveling to these far off wild places in search of adventure. We had all day to explore the area after traveling through the night from Katmai National Park. We arrived to beautiful windless conditions, so kayaking was first and foremost on my mind. We also sent out a couple of skiff tours to show guests around, look for wildlife, and scout the outer bay portion of the area for good afternoon hiking options.

Our kayaking was picture perfect. The snowy mountains were reflected in the calm waters as we paddled a few miles around the spit. It's always such a pleasure to have these conditions to kayak in. We can get so close to shore and see the bottom passing below us. Migrating brants and beautiful harlequin ducks swam by. For a while we just drifted and took in the beautiful scenery. We were quite please, but things really ramped up when the skiff tours returned. Out at the headlands they had seen eleven bears. We decided right then to shift our location for the afternoon activities out to the point.

I led a small group of hard charger hikers up the ridgeline after a pretty difficult beach landing. We got hung up on a few rocks and had to work ourselves off with the small boat paddles. Once we were on land the real fun started. We climbed off the beach and out of a little valley onto the ridge line. Then we just went straight up. We got about 600' high before the soft heather turned into loose rocky scree fields. So that is where we made our summit. We also didn't want to go higher because a couple of brown bears were pacing around the ledge a few hundred feet above us. They ambled off the other way during our hike and we didn't see them again.

After reflecting and taking everything in, we started our descent. It was pretty easy walking down the heather strewn hillside. We could see our other hiking group, far off down the opposite side of the ridge. They had said something about seeing bears, so we walked ahead carefully. Once we made it down to the valley at the bottom near the beach, three bears came running down the opposite side. They kept looking behind them, like they were scared of something, and then they stopped to look at us. We were a good distance away, so they decided to keep running across the valley and up the other side. It was another thrilling bear encounter. This trip is shaping up to be pretty good for bears.

The final obstacle was almost too much for some of the slower hikers. It was a scoot down on your bum kind of slide. But everyone made it, with a little help, and we got down to a much better pickup area to finish off a wild day in Wide Bay.

We came across all of these large, dug-out holes in the tundra. I initially thought they looked too big to be a fox, until we came across this little guy. He stopped digging to watch us for a while, then kept digging away. At one point he disappeared completely into his hole. He must have heard a small mammal rustling around down there and though, "lunch!"

I flew my drone over the headlands to check out how deep they went. We ended up having bears run through this wet valley.

Drone shot of our floating adventure platform. We've got a small boats towing behind to get us ashore for adventures, and sea kayaks on standby, ready to kayak through some sea arches.

This would be our afternoon landing spot. One group climbed the ridgeline here as high as they could before turning and chasing our other hikers across the tundra.

It is always interesting hiking in bear country. Here a momma bear with three cubs races out of the alder and across the valley floor.

Our view looking deep into the bay.

Kayaking in wide bay. Our morning exploration involved kayaking around this huge spit. We saw brandts and harlequin ducks and enjoyed perfect kayaking conditions.

Beautiful reflections on our morning snorkel.

This could be a painting.

I had someone take my photo from the top of our hard charger hike at Wide Bay. You can see the Safari Explorer far down below.

It was a tough landing at low tide at the head of Wide Bay. Luckily our tall rubber boots did the job.

After getting dropped off in the shallow water, we had to continue on past the slippery algae. It wouldn't be an adventure without a few challenges.

This was the leg burner I was hoping for. We picked the safest way to get higher and higher, where the views got better and better.

Overlooking the bay.

Walking through the valley worked out well. We had to avoid the deeper water pools, and a family of bears.

This steep downhill was where we caught up to the other hiking group.

This was near the top of our hard charger hike.

Much needed relaxing and taking it all in at the top of our hike.

Sometimes you need a little help on your way up the mountain.

The wildflowers are coming up.

I did tell them it was going to be a hard charger.