We had another unbelievably fabulous trip to Alaska where we had an opportunity to do a great deal of flight-seeing and picture taking as well as catch some Salmon and Halibut. We took well over 6,000 pictures while up there and I have posted some of them on my website, www.greatlandphotography.com. I would hope that you would visit the site and look at the Alaska and Fishing sections and check out some of my shots.

We spent two days in Katmai National Park, which is the home of the largest concentration of Brown Bears anywhere on the North American Continent. We flew in on a float plane and spent two days viewing and photographing the bears as they fed on Sockeye Salmon during the latter part of the Sockeye Salmon run in the river system that we were on. These bears continue to feed on salmon until about mid-October when the bears will then move to the hillsides and feed on berries before the first snows of winter hit.

They will enter a eating phase called hyper-phasia where the bears eat voraciously in their attempt to store as much food and fat as they can prior to starting their hibernation, which is usually sometime in November, depending upon the snow levels, temperatures, and winter’s arrival. I always love to photograph these magnificent animals as they are fun to watch and to study.

On this trip we had an opportunity to view three different sets of Spring Cubs who are always entertaining. Spring Cubs are those cubs who are in their first year of life. Cubs will stay with their mother until the Summer of their third year of life, when mama will kick them out to fend for themselves.

Baby brown bears aren’t much different than puppies or little kids. They can be rambunctious, eat like pigs, and run around and play and get into trouble without even trying. The mother bear, or Sow, is extremely protective of her babies and the interaction between her and any male bears, or Boars, can be very interesting.

I am always asked by people if I am afraid of flying into the National Park and taking pictures and observing these bears. Because they are protected in the park and have no reason to fear humans, they are not terribly concerned with our presence. Oh, make no mistake that they know we are there but they do not fear or become bothered by humans. I always tell people that Salmon taste a whole lot better to a bear than do people and that about the only thing that a "big" Brown Bear is worried about is a "bigger" Brown Bear. This is no joke this is reality as the bigger or biggest bear is the one that all of the other bears give way to.

If you have ever contemplated a trip to Alaska and doing it in some manner other than a cruise ship, I would be more than willing to share with you my insight and experiences in Alaska. My wife Cindy and I have been traveling to Alaska for 25 years now and we have been there more than 40 times. We have never gone up on a cruise ship, primarily because we have no interest in getting on a big boat with 3,500 of our closest friends and spending a week a sea with them.

If you are into cruising then I would say that taking a cruise through the Alaska Inside Passage would be a great cruise, but what a cruise is not is a great way to actually see Alaska, and I mean the more interior regions of the state. I have helped many people plan trips to the 49th State and while it can be expensive if you choose to go on a "high-end" trip, there are ways to see Alaska on a much more affordable basis.

Furthermore, airfare from LAX or LB, via Alaska Airlines or JetBlue is actually very affordable and the flight is only about 5 hours. Anchorage is a beautiful city, the largest city in the state, and the surrounding regions, including the amazing Kenai Peninsula, is somewhere that you can go for two weeks and not even scratch the surface of what is there.

Alaska is a photographer's paradise and it is where fishermen or outdoorsmen go when they die! Another thing I like about it is that it is 2 ½ times the size of Texas and I always love to remind those from Texas of that fact.

I will be following up on this article in the next couple of days with my observations and comments about the current mess in Washington D.C. I also plan on discussing the upcoming city elections so stay tuned!