Brown Bear Safari with Tom Bol Photo Workshops - September 2022

Katmai National Park

For the first time we explored Katmai National Park by raft during our Brown Bear Safari. This allowed us to float right through the heart of the world's largest sockeye salmon run, with bears fishing on either side of the river.

One day we hiked up to five miles with numerous stream crossings. We never knew what we would see around the next corner.

Getting a low perspective on our hiking day.

Leaping Bears

One of the most exciting actions to photograph is bears leaping into the river to catch salmon. Whether they leaped from the bank or ran through the stream, we kept our frame rates high and marveled at their ability to catch fish.

All smiles on a rainy hiking day

It was an abundant year for both salmon and bears. We saw more than 100 brown bears on two of the days of our workshop.

Team Louisiana, ready for the river
Fresh fish for dinner
"There's another one"

Brooks Camp in Katmai National Park

Brooks Camp was our destination for two days. We watched salmon jump up the falls and land in between large male boars. The elevated platforms at Brooks also gave us a higher perspective to capture bears swimming through emerald green water.

Slow motion shooting at the falls
Plenty of Z9s on this trip as well as a few Canons
Swimming in the salmon stream

Bears on the Beach

The beach at Brooks is a causeway for bears. They walk up and down the beach, sometimes forcing photographers to retreat to the plane's floats.

Brooks bears in the river
The rangers called this bear 747....he was enormous!

Sockeye Salmon

A healthy salmon run is the key to having bears at our locations. The run was strong this year. We witnessed bright red sockeyes swimming in the river, dying on the shore and leaving roe for next years young.

Frequent stream crossings were no match for these photographers

With so many bears to photograph we worked on editing images back at the lodge. Low key editing was popular as well as using masks in PhotoShop and Lightroom.

Two guys we found along the river
Fall color in Katmai National Park

More than Salmon

Willow ptarmigan, Glaucous Winged Gulls, Bald Eagles, Golden Eagles and Harlequin Ducks were some of the bird species we saw on the trip. On the final morning before heading home, a few of us paddled out on Lake Iliamna in kayaks and were treated to an up close encounter with an eagle as we rounded a corner.

Tim in the zone
Out on Lake Iliamna
Great weather. Even a clear night for aurora viewing

Thanks to our workshop participants for a wonderful workshop in Katmai National Park!

Our group on Jerry Jacques' dock

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