We decide to burn a day and some jet fuel to see bears feeding on salmon in Katmai National Park west of Anchorage. From the air we spot a few float planes in the area, but can’t land since the beach is too narrow. So we land on the only flat patch of ground we can find, right next to the bear-viewing platform. During our rather noisy landing we see three frightened bears running away from us. We are in the right spot.
Before we manage to stop the rotors, we are surrounded by 10 park rangers, many of them armed. They are in total shock as no one has ever landed a heli here before. The rangers inform us that we violated 3 federal laws:
Violation 1: It’s illegal to land an aircraft in a National Park. The floatplanes are commercial tour operators with special permits.
Violation 2: Helicopters are banned in Katmai because they make too much noise.
Violation 3: Our landing frightened the bears, which is a federal offense.
To make things worse, this particular bear-viewing platform is the holy-of-holies of the national park system in Alaska with rather militant rangers. Just our luck.
As the rangers consult Anchorage to decide what “legal action” to take against us, we learn that bears have more rights than we do. We are told that pilots routinely have their aircraft possessed by the Park Service for breaking these laws. I get worried as Top Gun Ranger points to our heli and says, “Sure would look nice in dark green with yellow stripes.” Those are the colors of the US Park Service. I am starting to regret coming here.
Using the negotiation skills we learned up in Russia, we fight to maintain ownership of our heli. Michel, with a heavier French accent than I remember him having, convinces the rangers that as a foreign pilot, he can’t be expected to know all the local laws. We settle for a $700 fine for wildlife harassment. That’s over $200 a bear, but at least we get to keep our helicopter.
Wednesday 4 July
A pleasant day flying down the coast of Alaska. We stop often to land on glaciers. Turns out that glaciers are protected under America law. Landing on them is another federal violation, but at this point who’s counting? On one glacier, we meet a dogsled operator who keeps 100 huskies up there for the summer. Its quite an operation with hundreds of pounds of meat flown up daily. We take a little dogsled ride, but at 6 miles an hour decide to stick with the heli for transportation.
Thursday 5 July
