On our third day in Churchill we were in a new tundra buggy (they’re very similar but don’t tell the drivers that!) and with a new guide, Jim Baldwin. We had quite different conditions when we were heading out as there was quite a bit of sunshine. We didn’t have the best of luck with the bears though and our options were far more limited than in the previous days. The sparring males had moved on from where they’d been during the previous days and our incredibly good fortunes had dropped back to normality.
The highlight of the day was finding a snowy owl. We’d seen one very late whilst returning to town on a previous day but this time it was out in the open and in good light. The only problem was getting close enough to it. It’s quite comical slowly chasing an owl in a gigantic vehicle but that’s what we did. The image below is a significant crop but I’m actually very pleased with how well it came out. It’s not like I expect to be photographing snowy owls again anytime soon too.
By the end of day 3 I was in need of a change of scenery. The tundra buggy experience is great but 3 days in a row was definitely enough for me. Thankfully the next 2 days would be spent in rental vehicles on the local roads. There were only 4 in the whole town and we had 3 of them and they felt like they were held together in places with a bit of tape and a lot of hope. Churchill may not be connected to anywhere by road but it does have the roads out to the tundra buggy launch sites as well as to a research station and a few other places.
The primary goal on the 4x4 days was to see some of the smaller animals but on our first day we found polar bears. You need to have your wits about you when getting out of vehicles to photograph the bears because they can run incredibly quickly over that terrain. They can also move very quietly too and generally it wasn’t the bear in front of us that was the concern, it was that there were other bears in the area and we’d need to keep an eye all around us inbetween taking photographs. I kept things very simple on both days and just had my D850 with the very lightweight 500mm PF lens which meant I could easily move and photograph quickly and wouldn’t feel too encumbered. On my favourite opportunity of the day (below) I was able to get quite low down to give a really different perspective on a bear after a few days of shooting down towards them.
On the second 4x4 day Danny had a tip on where we might find red foxes and it was a good one. We found a red fox sat on top of a little ridge. We decided to walk nearer to it as a group for a short amount of time to try and get photos before scarpering back to the vehicles as you never want to be far from the truck in case a bear shows up. When we got too close the fox decided it had suffered enough of us but I was able to get a shot I was really happy with nonetheless.
We did have another polar bear encounter on the same day but none of the images ended up being as good as from the many other opportunities on the trip. At the very end of the day we briefly saw a silver fox but the light had gone and the fox was pretty elusive. Still a lovely thing to see though.
We had to get our suitcases packed up in the morning of the final day as we’d be going straight back to Churchill airport after the tundra buggy. So we rejigged our bags a little, got another big breakfast in and then we set out for the buggy. After two days in the 4x4s I was really happy to be back on a buggy. There’s just so much space and it feels a lot more relaxing, despite occasional bumps. Our big goal for the day was to find a mum with a cub because it was really the last thing on our list to find. Unfortunately when we did find some, they were hunkered down behind a bush and it wasn’t the photo opportunity we were after.
As we headed across the tundra we found a lone bear keeping cool on the ice by some water and it was a lovely opportunity. We shot it from a few different angles as we crept along but it ended up being one of my favourite little portions of the whole trip. You know it’s good when Danny is getting particularly excited. The bear was also doing his best job of modelling a few poses too just to work the cameras.
We stopped for lunch at the far end of where the tundra buggy can go and had the occasional photo opportunity but nothing outstanding. It felt like our trip was slowly winding up and we’d perhaps had the best of it and I was very glad for our good fortune. Then as we headed into afternoon it all kicked off as a mother with a pair of cubs were seen walking across the ice not too far from us. What ensued was the funniest car chase I’ve ever been in (probably the only one!). We were trying to get ahead of the bears to stop for photos but it felt like we were only going a tiny amount faster than them. We were all firing off photos as best we could from the moving vehicle but the vibrations you get from it really cause almost every photo to be blurry beyond worth. We stopped occasionally when the sceney meant we had better shots and then we lined up near them once they’d settled down in a little group to huddle together for extra warmth. It was the perfect way to top off the trip and we stayed with them until we needed to head off in time to get to our plane.
We flight took us back to Winnipeg for the night and then we travelled back to the UK via another long layover in Toronto with the group slowly disspiating due to different flights back. At least the layover time meant that we finally got to the bottom of exactly what Meatloaf wouldn’t do for love. I would absolutely recommend this trip to someone who wanted to photograph polar bears. Check out the trips at https://www.natures-images.co.uk/holidays/ to see if they’re running one. I’ll write a final blog on practical considerations for the trip about the photography and conditions that may be useful to anyone who finds it who is heading there too.