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We’re pretty far from Churchill now
though, so — puffing up my chest and
looking as big as I can — I glance over
my shoulder at our purpose-built polar
exploration vehicle: a hulking 4WD
powerhouse, with huge wheels and
seats bolted to it. Staff have dubbed it
‘the rhino’. Unfortunately, it has neither
doors nor roof, so won’t provide much
protection from a 2.5m (8ft!) bear.
Andy usually discourages them from
approaching us simply by talking, or
clicking a couple of rocks together —
methods that I’ve already seen him
use — but his chatter goes unheeded
this time. Butch remains mute. His
grandfather once advised him, ‘Don’t
tell the white man all our secrets at
once,’ and the tight-lipped guide has
apparently taken this lesson to heart.
In fact, I’m also relishing the
opportunity to study this polar bear up
close. Her unique physiology — slightly
webbed toes and musculature across
her chest designed for swimming —
defines her species as the world’s only
marine bear. Even as she stalks us
she still looks utterly adorable, but I
realise the situation has escalated when
Butch, whose hawk-eyed tracking has
hitherto been silent, bursts into life
and launches a few stones towards the
bear. They explode like waterbombs
in the puddles around her and she
retreats, momentarily startled, before
fear turns to annoyance and she’s back.
Butch jumps into the rhino and
aggressively revs the engine, making the
vehicle lurch forward. After his ballistic
assault on the polar bear, though,
she barely breaks stride at the racket,
and as soon as he kills the motor her
attention is again fixed solely on us.
Bang! At last, a projectile rocketsfrom the barrel of Andy’s pistol. The
low-powered round arcs through
the air and bursts just by our polar
bear’s brow. It even makes my ears
ring where I’m standing, so our poor
bear must be deafened and, with a
thunderclap that enshrouds her head
in a cloud of smoke, she finally flees.
As Andy bins his spent cartridges
and pours us coffee from a flask,
I spy Butch’s redundant shotgun
sat idle in the rhino, and note the
absence of a pistol on his hip.
‘Sure, I have one,’ he smiles
over the brim of his mug, and
produces a gun from a leatherette
case. ‘The company gave it to me
years ago when I first joined.’
‘When did you last have
to use it?’ I ask him.
He smirks in a way that silently
betrays millennia of untold land-
lore (maybe he just thinks I’m
an idiot) and replies: ‘Never.’Inspired to travel? To book a trip, call
+971 4 316 6666 or visit dnatatravel.com‘
THEY’RE SUCH
FREQUENT
VISITORS TO
TOWN THAT
CHURCHILL EVEN
HAS A TEAM OF
‘BEAR COPS’
AND A POLAR-
BEAR HOLDING
FACILITY’
CANADA
This page: A tundra buggy
ferries passengers looking
for polar bears at sunset in
Cape Churchill
Opposite: A polar bear
rests upCredit:James Draven/The Sunday Times Travel Magazine/News Licensing