Polar bear #8 - Wednesday, July 13

On the National Geographic Expeditions website there is a video of a bear walking right up to the ship on the ice. It's really a cool movie but I expected it was a rare event. Up to today, the bears were a long way off (except for the swimmer) and only really viewable through the binoculars or spotting scope.
The ship headed south again thru the Hinlopen Strait and soon we were pushing thru the pack ice near Wilhelmøya Island. The naturalists & crew on the Bridge were constantly on the spotting scopes but it was one of the off-duty Phillapean kitchen crew who sounded the alarm. The announcement came over the ship's intercom, "Bear sighted on the ice" and as before, most of the passengers put on their parkas & hats, grabbed their cameras & binoculars & headed to one of the 4 forward decks. What happened for the next hour was a truly magical experience that the captain said later was a once-in-a-season event.
The shipped stopped in the ice & the young bear could be seen in the binoculars walking toward the ship. Every few steps he would sniff the air & taste it with his (or her) long tongue. Stefan, the bear expert, said that young bears are both very curious & without any experience with ships so as long as everyone was very quiet it was possible that he would approach fairly closely. Indeed, he eventually came close enough to sniff the hull. I was in the bow on the lowest deck leaning over the rail perhaps 15' above the bear & mostly holding my breath. This is what we came for!!!

Eventually someone on an upper deck dropped a camera tripod. The bear didn't jump but he lost interest & wandered off pausing occasionally to look back & sniff.
Later that day we saw 12 more bears but only #19 was close to being as interesting.
See Photo Gallery