We slept a bit on the “bear alert”, but well out of the way of where we saw its trek. “Let’s hope for a quiet night” Mikko said as we crept into the tents. We all expected one of the two alarms (one for food, the other for the kayaks) to go off. But no, we really got a quiet night.
We had planned to explore an inlet where no motorised traffic is allowed.
As we paddled off the sun came out and it became really warm in the dry suit. And then we spotted a small island with some tiny shell sand beaches between granite “svaberg” outcrops. We decided to go in and set up camp and let the inlet come to us. Only Erling went for a small tour to look at a braided river and its delta and fetch some extra fresh water for clothes washing or at least cleansing after a sea water wash.
It became a glorious day in the sun, with frequent dips to cool down. In the company of black oystercatchers and arctic terns, a few sea otters, seals and a lone humpback whale (of the day).
In the end we even got the tarp out to get some shade.
It was more a skerry than an island, just a couple of small trees in the middle of a 50 by 20 meter rocky outcrop
(granite with some mafic xenolites, in case you were wondering)
Still, under those trees a bear had had its day bed. To judge by the associated droppings it had not been used for a long time.
No more birds nests to plunder and the wild strawberries not yet ripe, there wasn’t much for a bear to justify wasting precious calories on. Of course the bear might not have “gotten that memo“. On the other hand we have not been ashore even a handful of times without finding traces of bear activity. It literally goes with the territory.
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