Last Frontier Days
Polar Attraction: A Bear-Watching Trip to Utqiagvik
Review by Hank Nuwer
Last weekend arrived, and it was time for us to fly out to yet another remote Alaska city, because that’s my wife Gosia’s bucket list dream. We’ve recently scratched Cordova, Sitka, King Salmon, Dillingham, Juneau and Wrangell off her list.
I’ve been all over northern Alaska from my freelance days when I interviewed interesting Alaskans like mushers and remote Alaska Troopers for two satellite dish magazines.
This time I got to choose a city for her. I picked Utqiagvik, otherwise known before a name change as Barrow, Alaska. It’s the northernmost city in North America.
As always, Gosia conducted detective work to plan the trip’s activities.
“We’re going to take a tour to see if we can see polar bears in the wild north of the city,” she announced at supper.
“Really,” I said, delighted. “I didn’t know polar bears lived so close to the city.”
“If you want to learn something, just ask your wife,” cracked Mrs. Smarty Pants.
“Oh really,” I snapped. “You just checked Mr. Google before I had a chance to do it.”
So, that’s how and why we found ourselves last Sunday as passengers in a heavy-duty, full-size SUV that looked like it could win in a collision with a Sherman tank.
We booked the expedition with 71 North Tours, LLC, a family business owned by an Inupiat couple. Our driver was Benjamin Elavgak, a young man born and reared in the area.
Elavgak picked us up at King Eider at 1 p.m. We paid his companion $160 each for the two-hour excursion.
I guessed the money taker was a high school football player for the Barrow Whalers. We had passed by their blue field on Saturday morning, and Gosia photographed the cheerleaders warming up.
“Did you win yesterday?” I asked.
“I tore a ligament and couldn’t play, but we won 22-14 against Homer,” he said. “It was revenge because they beat us earlier 34-0.”
In the SUV, Elevgak delivered interesting introductory remarks on Alaska’s declining polar bear population. I complimented his professionalism and courtesy. He shrugged as if he knew no other way but the right way to treat tour guests.
“Barrow, it’s a small town, and it can be dangerous in the cold winters, and so everyone depends on everyone else. We’re taught to show respect to everyone.”
Gosia remarked that we had good fortune to have him assigned as our guide. He not only had guided for years, but he also had participated in Native whale-hunting expeditions.
After a long, slow ride on unkempt beach trails, our driver stopped the SUV at a Beaufort Sea beach with a large, bare island visible in the distance. The driver called this place Point Barrow.
Upon our arrival, I saw that uncountable numbers of bleached bones of whales littered the beach. The Inupiat conduct traditional bowhead whale hunts twice a year.
Someone had stacked a few bones in ornamental fashion. “They’re our palm trees,” the driver joked.
So far north, of course, I saw not a single tree growing here at the sea.
“Don’t take a bone as a souvenir in your luggage,” our driver warned. “It’s a federal offense.”
Our tour guide handed a Chinese-American female tourist and me sets of binoculars.
Gosia squinted through her camera’s telephoto lens to check the island’s beach.
I watched the sea waves build and explode at wondrous heights.
He pointed out the tracks of a polar bear who traveled here last night or this morning. Each print showed a paw bigger than a giant frypan.
“Keep an eye out,” the driver warned us. “Polar Bears sometimes hide out at that pond across the way and can jump out.”
Gulp! Jump out?
Gosia and I kept two eyes out instead of one.
Many times, hungry polar bears in the Barrow area have unwisely left the sea and shambled into town. If locals or authorities can’t haze them back to the sea, they get destroyed. The years 1990-1993 saw quite a surge in reports of bears smashing garbage cans to get at scraps. About 30 years ago, while in my rental car, I almost collided with a scavenging grizzly bear in Willow, Alaska.
So, my wife and I stayed vigilant on this tour even though the risk of an encounter was very low.
In January of 2023 a polar bear slaughtered a mother and son near a school in Wales, Alaska. It was the first such fatal attack in three decades.
. . .
In minutes, our sharp-eyed guide told us to focus on a place on the island’s broad beach. Two adult male bears lumbered along in no hurry at all.
This was all we had hoped for on this journey—and more!
The Chinese-American woman gave excited squeals. Earlier in the van, she confided that seeing polar bears in the wild was a long-held dream.
I looked over at Gosia as she planted herself and snapped photo after photo, adjusting her aim as the bears traveled.
Now, our guide also grew excited. “Look at the water in front of the island,” he said. “It’s a mama and her cub, a pretty big cub.”
The bears appeared to be yellowish-white, although their fur is colorless, and their skin is black. They just appear to us as white.
For about one hour we observed the bears. Never once did they check us out.
. . . .
Are you also one of the many folks who dream of enjoying Alaska’s giant mammals in their own habitat? It’s easier than you may have imagined.
To get to Barrow and to return, you’ll take a 10-hour flight from Indianapolis to Anchorage and expect to stay one day. Anchorage has a first-class museum, souvenir shops, and super restaurants. I’d recommend the to-die-for halibut or salmon at Humpy’s Great Alaskan Alehouse.
The next day you’ll get to the airport by 12:45 p.m. Alaska Airlines offers limited daily service from Anchorage to Barrow. You’ll need to check in at 1:45 p.m. for the two-hour flight.
Upon arrival in Utqiagvik around 4:30 p.m., you should grab your checked luggage and walk five minutes to UIC Car Rental, (907) 852-2700. Hurry because the office closes at 5 p.m.
I suggest you reserve a Ford SUV, UIC’s lowest-cost vehicle. Still, like everything in remote Barrow, the daily cost is above $100 per day. Be sure you bring the mandatory proof of insurance. Gas costs $6.49 a gallon, the same price as a single avocado at the local food store.
This is important. You cannot drive a vehicle past the high school football stadium to reach the bear viewing area. The road lined with duck-hunter shacks is treacherous with wet, piled gravel. Many a transmission has boiled and died here. The car rental is only to explore the town.
By far the biggest visitor attraction here is the Inupiat Heritage Center, but its world-class exhibits and artifact collections only are open Monday through Friday. That means you’ll need to arrive here between Sunday and Thursday, not on a Friday as we did.
For lodging, you have two can’t-go-wrong choices, the King Eider Inn and the Top of the World Hotel.
The King Eider, named for a local bird treasured by hunters, is a two-minute walk from the airport. The lobby and rooms are decorated with cabin-style furniture. The manager, Jack Phan, patiently answers every question.
King Eider offers cooking facilities, although no restaurant of its own.
Instead of King Eider, consider spending up to $100 more a night to lodge at the posh Top of the World Hotel, 3060 Eben Hopson Street.
My wife and I visited its lobby on Saturday at noon to marvel at its exhibits of native crafts and carvings.
While there, we decided to have lunch at the hotel’s spacious restaurant.
A helpful female server discouraged us from ordering the salmon burgers.
“They are only this big,” she said, making a circle with thumb and forefinger.
“The salmon portions are huge, and we have some very fresh,” she whispered behind her palm.
We heeded her advice. The chef prepared us a scrumptious salmon dish in a tasty marinade
The restaurant offered specialty desserts, some coconut topped. However, we resisted temptation.
. . . .
Although Barrow has a population of only around 5,000 tops, it hosts many ethnic cafes and takeout spots.
On Friday night, Gosia and I tried Sam & Lees Restaurant after perusing a menu left at our inn.
Here we had excellent service as we polished off a family Chinese meal consisting of chicken soup (perfect on a 30-degree evening), egg rolls, Mongolian beef and sweet & sour chicken for $38 each. Hot green tea cost extra.
A friendly, elderly Chinese manager came over to flirt with Gosia when we went to pay our bill—stuffed to the gills, I might add.
“How long have you been in Barrow?” she asked.
“Me? Forty years,” he said.
On Saturday night we stopped at Osaka for Japanese fare.
We ordered the small Sushi Boat platter for $70. The menu promised 13 pieces of hand=pressed Nigri and a California roll.
The helpful waitress brought us extra-large portions of sushi shrimp, salmon, tuna, a smoked fish, and yellow tail fish. We never received the California roll, but we didn’t ask for it. The large portions had us stuffed.
Next time in Barrow we’ll probably give Osaka’s a chance, but the shrimp and tuna was too dry, as if the pieces had sat too long and lost moisture.
. . . .
All good things must end, including another trip concluded off Gosia’s bucket list. After our tour driver left us at King Eider around 3:10 p.m., we dropped off the rental car with a full tank.
Your return trip will be out of Utqiagvik at 5 p.m., our plane flew to our connection at Ted Stevens Airport in Anchorage.
You have a choice of several red-eye flights to take the same day, Anchorage to Indianapolis. The Anchorage airport is small and walkable.
Once home, Gosia cherrypicked through a stack of weekend mail and chuckled.
She handed me an expensive brochure from a Canada natural habitat adventure company offering an “unrivaled polar bear experience.”
“What a coincidence this came now,” she said, fanning herself with the brochure. “For only $8,000, they can give us the same polar bear adventure we had in Barrow with 71 North Tours for $320.”
Contributing writer Hank Nuwer once was a regular restaurant and food reviewer for national airline magazines. Remember them?