Trip on Bluewater Adventures’ Island Odyssey to Khutzeymateen Inlet, British Columbia
Day 1
After a manic six months over-occupied with two book launches, perhaps a hundred interviews, and our TV show launches, this trip is mainly a rare chance to simply unwind. I’ve been invited as a guest by Bluewater Adventures owner Randy Burke and bear expert Barrie Gilbert, who in the early 1970s was “killed,” as he puts it, after accidentally surprising a sleeping Grizzly as he topped a ridge. My easy job is to do a few readings in the evenings and to help out identifying birds and other wildlife for the other people on board. In exchange, I get to voyage a large portion of British Columbia’s north coast. Ultimately, our destination is a Grizzly Bear sanctuary called Khutzeymateen—which means, in native Tsimshian, “long inlet in a steep valley.” But the destination is partly an excuse for the pleasures of getting there!
