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One Polar Bear for Every Five Citizens
These Dangerous Predators Are Now Permanent Guests in Churchill, Manitoba, Canada!
By Peter Baunmartner
In one of the smaller buggies in front of us, there is some concern. A huge bear is standing up against the buggy. His nose reaches up to the slightly open window. The courageous polar safari adventurers jump back, even though the bear is only curious. His sense of smell is his best weapon. With this he can smell the seals through ice, which is 1 meter thick. From our buggy, the smell of the warm vegetable soup entices him. The bears are totally quiet; they do not make a sound. They also kill very quietly, Debra tells us.
In the evening we go to the only local watering hole. Drinking seems to be one of the lonely joys during the long, dark winter months. The inhabitants of Churchill are very friendly, but also a little strange. Denise sleeps with a revolver under her pillow. But, of course, even some Americans do that. But she lives on the edge of the Churchill River in a very isolated lodge. For Denise, the town of Churchill was too hectic.
Jack tells us the same story for the third time, but it is Louise who captures our attention. She is not a lover of the polar bear tourism – she hates the bears because they make life very hard on her in October and November. During this time period, her children are not able to play outside unsupervised. They cannot even walk alone to school – they are picked up by the school bus at their door and dropped off again at the end of the day. Louise tells us she hates the bears, but perhaps it is the isolation which bothers her. As we are leaving, she whispers to us, "You know they really do bait the bears, even though they are not allowed to."
