Kaktovik Tours, Alaska, United States

5Raja N 5:00 PM Feb 11, 2020

Fabulous must see adventure vacation
We had been planning this trip for nearly 5 years and finally made it in Sep 2019. This was our closest encounter with Polar bears and the boat was rock solid for great pictures. The boat has heaters to keep us warm. Ketil was a brilliant skipper and positioned us well for some great photographs. He arranged for chartered flights from Fairbanks for our group which was well worth it as local flights can get cancelled cause of bad weather. Highly recommend them and well worth the cost.

5mkwli 5:00 PM Oct 24, 2018

Kaktovik Tours Simply the Best
We just came back from Kaktovik a week ago and like to thank Ketil and his son Martin for a fantastic polar bear photo tour. We went to Churchill in 2013 and felt in love with polar bears, and were searching for another location to photo polar bears a year before this trip. We considered Svalbard and other popular locations, and decided on Kaktovik. We then checked Tripadvisor to see which operator we should go with and decided on Kaktovik Tours, primarily for two reasons: (i) its boat has a heated cabin, and (ii) it has a 4x4 bus that can be used on land in bad weather or when the sea is frozen. This choice turned out to be our critical success factor. We are photo enthusiasts and didn’t go to Kaktovik to view bears, but to photo them. We brought along with us 100-400mm and 500mm/600mm lenses. We also wanted to photo bears with white snowy background, and so could not have gone early in the season. With wind chill, the effective temp was like -15 C or lower, and so despite our heavy-duty Canada Goose jackets, we found the heated cabin essential. We simply could not have photographed hours in the cold without a warm cabin to hide from time to time. What we didn’t know before our trip was that the boat is equipped also with stabilizers at its front and back, and so in the shallow coastal water the boat was rock stable and helped our photos a lot. The boat is also strengthened to push through icy waters. We therefore called it “ice-breaker”. Other boats have to follow our way! The boat can take up to 6 guests. But for serious photographers, we would recommend no more than 4 with long (500mm f4 and longer) telephoto lenses. To assure the success of our trip, we booked 4 nights in Kaktovik to allow for bad weather and flight problems. It turned out that we had no major flight issues despite some changes in flight times. Out of the 4 days, we had one perfect sunny day, two days with strong wind and snow storm, and one cloudy day. The bears were most active on the sunny day. It was good to be able to photo bears in different weather conditions. For two of the days, the boat couldn’t be used due to the very strong wind, and so the ability to photo from the bus was important. We saw no less than 15 bears each day, some close and some afar. We were also most pleased to find polar bear cubs of different sizes. If one’s objective is simply to see/view bears, a pair of good binoculars will be your best friend, and you will surely be most satisfied. To properly photo them, the 500mm would be ideal. We found 600mm sometimes too long when bears were in groups and active. Relative to Kaktovik, Churchill is easier and more comfortable for bear viewing from those large polar rovers. Food and lodging are also better at Churchill. But our experience was that the bears there were more scattered, were less active and rarely had small cubs. The boat and mini-bus at Kaktovik allowed low angle photos and to shoot both from land and sea. The groups are smaller and therefore more flexible. We therefore would recommend Kaktovik highly over Churchill. If you are interested in seeing what photos are possible from a trip with Kaktovik Tours, please ask Ketil for a link to my photosite.