My Seal River Lodge diary – Day 3 – 7th September 2017

Sunrise over Hudson Bay

If you are awake throughout most of the night you might as well go outside to watch the sun rise over Hudson Bay (and Bryan, since he was still there). And don’t think Jad didn’t remind us every evening to NO FORGET to reset our camera in the morning to our normal settings. I can confirm that resetting only some things does not help with taking good pictures!

This morning I had the weasel for company again (and wrong camera settings). There was a bit of a comical moment, when it whizzed towards Bryan, didn’t manage to stop and run right into him. This gave Bryan a bit of a fright: He even lifted his head!

Boat adventure

Today’s weather was a bit mixed. It was very windy which brought a bit of a chill with it. Best day for a boat trip so it seemed. Lets just say, the water was not terribly calm.

We wore great buoyancy jackets from the lodge, which were super warm too (AND MINE WAS YELLOW – how awesome is that), so everything was good.

We were hoping to find some more bears at the mouth of Seal River, since this is where they often hang out in summer. But apparently not this autumn.

We had a little seal check us out, but that was about it. I still love being on the water though, even if it is a bit rough.

Bear tracks

In the afternoon we went on another fun hike through the tundra, with findings of sculls, flowers and colourful rocks and tracks, from bears, caribous and wolfs. Yes, it would have been nice to see more bears on our hikes, but this is nature for you and there isn’t much you can do about it. And here is some travel advice: If this would make you “hate” such a trip, don’t come. Just go to the zoo. If you think it is boring to stay at a place for longer to see if you can spot some wild life, don’t come either. You can do better things with you money instead of wasting it on such a trip. And if you middle name is Myrtle (Moaning Myrtle – Harry Potter – get it?) please stay away instead of ruining it for everybody else. RANT OVER!

Northern sky illumination

The day was closing in. The sunset was stunning and we had to interrupt dinner to go outside to visit Bryan again. This time he should be modelling for us in the orange sunset lights. I think Bryan has a lot to learn. To be frank, he is rubbish in working the camera. Didn’t do great posing whatsoever. Good job we had Rob with us. He positioned himself perfectly in the last beams of light and was only slightly uncomfortable when everybody’s cameras were directed at him.

But this day wasn’t meant to be over yet. The sky looked promising and I can confirm, that sleep was heavily interrupted. Finally the sky did welcome us with a firework of light. I woke up just short of 1am and looked outside. There it was, the faintest of lights. To get dressed didn’t take very long and when I came outside Jad and Jack where also there, trying to decide if this is enough to wake everybody up. It for sure was. Everybody came outside to watch the northern lights.

Felix and myself stood outside for hours and watched the spectacle. Being patient really paid off. Most people went to bed when the lights started to faint. It was just us outside watching the sky, when it literally exploded. From one to the other moment the lights went from faint little green glows to most impressive light bows shooting over our heads, dancing and swirling, with an intensity not even the full moon could soften. We were cheering, because it was so exciting. We shouted inside the building to see if anybody was still up and wanted to see that. It was only a matter of minutes before the lights went back to normal. After nearly two hours in total we went back to bed. Thank you sun for whipping up a storm for us.

Posted in 2017, Canada, Nature, Travel.