An Ecologist’s View of Wild Alaska
A journey into wild Alaska in search of bears and beauty becomes an unexpected exploration of loss, resilience, and the question of who we become when life takes us somewhere we never expected to go.
About Beyond the Wonder
A grizzly stood knee-deep in an Alaskan river, staring straight at me. Then he bolted in my direction.
I kept taking pictures while frantically wondering what I should do. He came closer and closer until a sockeye salmon suddenly darted from the water. The bear veered away and chased the fish. I had come to Alaska hoping for encounters with bears. I hadn’t quite imagined one like this.
I planned that week in Katmai National Park and Preserve as a chance to photograph bears and experience a wilderness I had spent much of my professional life working to protect from thousands of miles away. But I arrived carrying something else with me. My wife had died, my career had taken unexpected turns, and I was struggling to understand the life I now found myself living.
Alaska kept surprising me. I stood in a clear river as dozens of sockeye salmon swam around my legs. I watched gulls shadow feeding bears, listened to a thrush beside a cabin at Lake Clark, thought about Dick Proenneke and the life he had chosen, and looked down from small airplanes onto volcanoes, glaciers, mountains, and immense stretches of wild country.
Again and again, what I encountered drew me beyond the natural history I had come to see. Bears, salmon, glaciers, people, and wild landscapes led me into questions about loss and resilience, family and career, the choices I had made, and the person I might still become.
Beyond the Wonder grew from that journey. It is my exploration of wild Alaska, but also of something I have come to believe more deeply: wild places matter not only because they sustain lives and ecological processes, but because of what can happen to us when we enter them with curiosity and allow ourselves to pay attention.
Chasing Funnel Creek
We flew south from Lake Clark to Katmai National Park. On the first day, we hiked from Mirror Lake down along Funnel Creek to look for bears. This is a set of photographs from that day.
We are starting back toward the planes. 
Sockeye circle just below the falls, resting before the leap. 
Two Harlequin ducks fly along Funnel Creek. 
Roe falls from the salmon as the bear grips its back and moves toward shore to eat the fish. 
The brown bear makes one last dash. 
Glaucous-winged Gulls followed the bears, hoping to grab any scraps. 
Focusing on its quarry, the brown bear moved in for the kill. 
The bear looked backward like it wasn’t happy with being watched.
Exploring Lake Clark National Park
We stayed at Port Alsworth in Lake Clark National Park. That park is the size of Connecticut and Rhode Island combined and contains extensive mountains and beautiful lakes.
Port Alsworth. 
We stopped for lunch at Portage Lake, high in the Mountains of Lake Clark National Park. 
The rolling hills near Twin Lakes in Lake Clark National Park. 
Dick Proenneke’s cabin on Upper Twin Lake, Lake Clark National Park. 
We were passing Iliamna Volcano on our flight back to Anchorage. A week well spent in the wilderness of the Katmai Peninsula. 
A snow field at the mountain top feeds a glacier. 
Wide river bottoms were carved by Pleistocene glaciers and now form fertile flood planes. 
The terminal moraine at the base of Shamrock Glacier. This moraine formed during the Little Ice Age.
Where to Buy Beyond the Wonder
Recognition and Reviews
“I have been lucky enough to spend a great deal of time in the outdoors with all its drama, beauty and splendor. And on my many walks with Tom Bancroft he’s taught to see the world through a gifted naturalist’s lens, seeing landscapes, details and powerful connections. With this book you can get a glimpse of Alaska from the grand to the granular. His terrific camera work and pithy prose brings that world alive for all.”— Tom Martin, Former CEO and President, The American Forest Foundation
“Thomas Bancroft is a master teacher. Through the effective use of vignettes, he demonstrates his deep knowledge of natural history, ornithology, geology, and interdependence of a natural ecosystem’s elements, while simultaneously working through significant personal loss.”—William Meadows, former President, The Wilderness Society
“If you have the good fortune to be in the field with Thomas Bancroft, you will be immersed in wonders detailed by his keen awareness of creatures and their relations in all directions. This book is the next best thing.”— Kim Stafford, Lewis and Clark College Emeritus Professor, former Oregon State poet laureate, and author, As the Sky Begins to Change
“Thomas’ travel through Alaska, reflecting on the timeline of his life, as well as that of Alaska’s social and natural history, reminds us of the importance of connection with the natural wonders in our lives. His words and photographs bring the majesty of Alaska’s glaciers, tundra, bears, and salmon into our living rooms and inspire us to seek our own inspiration in the natural world.”—Danielle Graham, The Mountaineers community leader
A brown bear tries to catch a sockeye when the fish attempts to climb Brooks Falls, Katmai National Park.
A Naturalist on the Katmai Peninsula
Join me for a journey through the Katmai Peninsula as I share the bears, salmon, landscapes, and experiences that became Beyond the Wonder.