We didn’t sleep great, perhaps because of the impending alarm.  It didn’t take too long to get ready.  We messaged Charlotte about Avon, giving her our express approval to book his flights, in case she needed anything before we left WiFi for the middle of nowhere.  We went downstairs and met Mike, who was our chaperone/cat herder for the morning at the airport.  He tagged our backpacks and our personal items as appropriate.  

It wasn’t a straightforward issue, as we’d be on two wildly differing flights this morning.  Our first flight was a commercial flight with Calm Air, albeit on a small turboprop, somewhat like the plane we used to take from Carlsbad to Los Angeles.  Our second flight, once in Churchill, would be on two, even smaller, planes operated by Churchill Wild, going from Churchill to the Seal River Heritage Lodge.  On the first flight we could have a tiny carry-on or personal item, and on the second flight basically everything had to be placed in the back of the plane.  Crystal had a small duffel that had our laptops and a couple other things we wanted to have with us, and Justin had his camera bag.  Meanwhile our backpacks, which had been carry-ons with Delta, had to be checked on the Calm Air flight.

The breakfast provided by the hotel (or maybe it was Churchill Wild) didn’t jump out at us, so Crystal just got tea and Justin just got some orange juice.  At 05:30, Mike got us all together and told us what would happen in the two airports, then made sure we were all prepared for the respective flights.  Once he got the thumbs up from us, we all walked across the street, checked in for the Calm Air flight, dropped our bags, went through security, then met back up by the gate.  This all seemed more difficult than necessary, but perhaps we were just cranky.

There was a weight issue with the plane, so there was a slight delay.  Mike went up to the desk and (we’re assuming) made it clear that Churchill Wild pays Calm Air a fortune and that none of our bags should be bumped from the flight.  Whilst watching this play out, we rekindled a conversation we’ve had several times, which is that it’s crazy that they never weigh people.  In fact, our flight to Lord Howe Island is the only time that we can remember us being weighed for a flight.  It’s so dumb to fret over 19 versus 22 pounds for a bag, but not care about 160 versus 260 pounds for a passenger.

It was a pain in the ass having to deal with the parkas during all of this.  They were massive, and would not smash down even a little bit.  We also had to use up one of our two arms carrying them, as we certainly weren’t going to wear them in the airport.  It was incredibly hot in the airport, which is nuts for a place where it’s so cold and people are already bundled up when they enter.  It reminded Justin of law school at UCLA, where during the warm months it was always 68 F (20 C) or less in class, and everyone in shorts and t-shirts shivered, and during the winter it was always 77 F (25 C) or warmer, and everyone dozed off.

After all of this “fun”, our flight eventually got on the plane, about 20-30 minutes late.  Even onboard there was more hassle, as there was no space for the parkas, and everyone looked around at everyone else, hoping someone else had a clever idea.  No one did.  [In hindsight, the best option might have been to sit on them.]  Eventually we got situated and ready for take-off.  Basically everything onboard was old and worn, but we hoped at least the mechanical portions were in good shape.  

We took off just as the black sky was turning to dark blue, so maybe around 07:30 or so.  We tried to sleep, but it was tough to get comfy.  Eventually the plane got cold, so that helped a bit, as the parkas functioned as blankets.  To our surprise, there was a decent snack and drink service.  On the less positive side, it was the loudest plane we can remember being on, and lots of stuff rattled also.  We went over Lake Winnipeg, then lots of flat land with smaller lakes everywhere.  We’re no experts, but maybe the terrain resembled Minnesota?  Two hours in, we went over a dam and hydroelectric plant, and that was about the only man-made scenery we saw.  Crystal read most of the flight, some true crime books she wanted to finish before we moved back to Tenerife.

In Churchill, the airport was tiny, with one room for boarding, baggage claim, waiting, etc. - it reminded us of the airport in Socotra last year.  We grabbed our bags from baggage claim and then arranged them with the Churchill Wild staff, which segregated them based on whether we were on the first plane to Seal River or the second.  We weren’t in the Churchill Airport very long, but took note of two things - it’s airline code YYQ (which has to be one of the most random we’ve been to), and a advertisement for Churchill Wild showing polar bears, a wolf, and the Northern Lights (our three main reasons for wanting to visit).  We hoped we’d be blessed enough to see all three.

We got on a bus for a short ride from the commercial airport to the hangar area where Churchill had its two planes.  Churchill was a tiny little town, and we think we saw about half of it on our drive.  Stephanie told us that the US used to have an air base in Churchill (maybe for re-fueling on the way to Europe?), but that closed decades ago.  We split into two groups at the hangar area and boarded our respective planes.  The two pilots were named Justin and Jason, and each had large beards and baseball caps.

The flight from Churchill to Seal River was very short, maybe 15-20 minutes.  As we were coming into land we saw several bears, and once on the landing strip, we could see a polar bear as we were walking from the plane to the ATV-type vehicle that was going to transport us to the lodge.  Ordinarily we would walk from the landing strip to the lodge, maybe a 5-10 minute walk, but there were bears everywhere and they hadn’t gone over our safety briefing yet.  There were at least two more bears right by the entrance gate to the lodge, and we would’ve had to walk right past them.  They were the welcome committee, we guess.  They were still visible right outside the window when we got into our room.  We also saw some sort of critter, we think a Hoary Marmot, but we aren’t sure of the specific name.

We had lunch at the lodge shortly after arrival.  We sat with Eric and Denise from Alaska, as well as Ben, the lodge manager.  Lunch was a chicken pot pie type thing, including one that was without mushrooms, as we’d noted on one of the various forms that Justin doesn’t eat mushrooms.  We found out that Eric is apparently not a fan either, so it was good to have two dishes for the table.  After lunch, we all got fitted for gear, plus told about what to expect.  Then we went out in the yard to go over some exercises.  They showed us how to walk together, how to act near bears, how to change formations to deal with bears that were getting a bit too close, etc.

The tundra is a fairly barren place, with not much density of plants, animals, etc.  Accordingly, it is a very quiet spot, and noises are a rarity.  Because of this, the first line of defense against a polar bear is to make loud noises, first with your voice, then by banging two rocks together.  These startle the bears, and (hopefully) reset their brain and send them on their way.  If that doesn’t work, our guides also had a starter pistol (again, for sounds), a flare gun (for sounds and distractions), and, if all else failed, an actual rifle.  But in the history of Churchill Wild, that had never been necessary.  Polar Bears don’t really see humans as food, nor as much of a threat, just some “scenery” out on the tundra, perhaps the same way animals like rhinos and lions see one another.

Our first walk started off to the north, along the western shore of Hudson Bay, going up and over various short ridges, across some boggy areas.  We then headed inland (west), towards the runway, then continued on south of the lodge and the runway.  Once south of the lodge we spent a lot of time on the other side of a stream from a bear that didn’t care about us in the slightest, so little that he shitted right in our view - welcome to Seal River.  At one point he started “mousing” - jumping up and banging down on the ground with his front paws.  This is a common behavior on the ice (trying to break it to get at seals), but is quite uncommon on solid ground, as there’s not really anything underground that would be worth all the effort.

After we spent our time with the bear, the light was getting low, so we went back to the hotel.  We had “appies” (appetizers) at 18:00, maybe 20 minutes after we got back.  We chatted with Neil and Denice from Perth for a while.  They were surprised we seemed to know so much about Perth and Western Australia, particularly since we’d never visited there.  We found out they were even less experienced in cold weather than us, and it was nice to know there were other softies around, as everyone else seemed quite experienced either living and/or traveling in polar landscapes.

At 18:30 we received a short introduction to the lodge, its staff, and the lodge rules.  One thing was abundantly clear - we were in the zoo, and we were not free to leave the zoo.  We weren’t even free to go into the yard in the back unless it was accompanied by a guide or to go straight up to the viewing platform.  The fence kept the polar bears out, but only in theory - they were more than strong enough to knock it down if they really wanted.  After the talk we had dinner, with Neil, Denice, and Boomer, one of the guides.  Boomer has been a guide in lots of places, including South Georgia.  He told us that the Shackleton Rum (or maybe whisky?) has been re-made, from the original recipe, and there are raffles for it, with the proceeds going for wildlife conservation.  Thankfully there wasn’t a raffle on our trip there, or we might not have had money for this trip.  As a guide in both the north polar region and the south, he had a concise description of the difference: “The north is already gone, the south is on its way.”  [We hope he’s wrong, but he would certainly know better than we.]  After dinner, we basically went straight to sleep.