The best place on earth to watch wild brown bears, and the overwhelming part, getting there, handled for you.
2028 stays from $3,475 per person · 3 nights from $4,575 · See rates
Check DatesBrooks Falls is the best place in the world to watch wild brown bears, and getting there is the part most people find overwhelming. That's the part we handle.
Each summer the bears gather at the falls to fish for salmon, a spectacle that draws visitors from around the globe. Katmai's ecosystem supports over 2,000 brown bears, more than the entire lower 48 combined.
At Brooks Falls you watch from the Park Service viewing platforms, on your own schedule, as close to wild as it gets. It isn't a herded group tour. It's the real thing, and you experience it on your own time.
What we do is make sure you actually get there. Flights, the trip out to the falls, lodging, and timing all have to line up in a place with no road in, and at some point planning it yourself stops being a trip and starts being a second job.
A single day trip is one shot, and Brooks is weather-dependent, so a foggy morning can cost you the whole thing with no second chance. Staying with us puts you at the falls across multiple days, so you get more chances at the light, the feeding windows, and the bears, with a built-in buffer if a day gets weathered out. You're already in King Salmon, so your days at Brooks Falls are the long, unhurried kind, and you can simply go back the next morning.
You stay with us on the Naknek River, the logistics are dialed in, and all the day-to-day planning is handled for you. We've done this hundreds of times.
We tell you exactly which flights from Anchorage to King Salmon to book, and when.
Your seat out to Brooks Falls, included in your package and timed around the bears and the weather.
Katmai access and the park logistics, sorted before you arrive.
A riverfront room at our six-guest lodge, with breakfast and your trip out to the bears included, part of a full-service package.
Every step lined up so no missed connection costs you a day at the falls.
Bears, salmon, and crowds shift week to week. Drag through the season for a month-by-month read from someone who has been to the falls hundreds of times.
July and September are the two windows, and they are different trips. In July the salmon are running hard and the bears stack up on the falls itself. In September the bears are at their heaviest after a summer of fishing, and they spread out along the river instead of crowding the falls, so you see them in more places and fewer at a time. Our season runs June through September.
On a good day, 10 to 15 bears at Brooks Falls. Katmai supports over 2,000 brown bears, more than the entire lower 48 combined, and the falls is where they concentrate while the salmon are running.
Day visitors do not need a permit. What you do need is a way to get there and a seat on it, which is the part we handle. The park rangers give a short bear orientation the first time you arrive at Brooks Camp, and you only need to attend it once even if you come back on later days.
There is no road in. It is a short floatplane hop from King Salmon, or a water taxi across the lake, and we run both so a weather day on one does not end your trip. Your seat out to the falls is included in your package.
It is one shot, and Brooks is weather-dependent, so a foggy morning can cost you the whole thing with no second chance. That is the main argument for staying rather than day-tripping: multiple days at the falls, more chances at the light and the feeding windows, and a buffer if a day gets weathered out.
Roughly 6 to 8 hours. We usually head out in the morning and are back in the afternoon or early evening. Those are estimates rather than a timetable, because weather drives everything out here and departure and return times can shift at short notice.
You watch from the Park Service elevated viewing platforms, and the rangers run a bear orientation before your first visit to Brooks Camp. The bears at Brooks are habituated to people watching them and are there for the salmon, not for you. Cameras are welcome.
About a year. We have six guest spaces total, the season is roughly a hundred days long, and the good months go first. If you are reading this in the autumn, you are looking at the following summer.
116 reviews across Google, Airbnb, TripAdvisor & Facebook, and the #1-rated B&B in King Salmon on TripAdvisor. Most guests arrive overwhelmed by the logistics of Brooks Falls, and leave wishing they'd booked more nights.
Send your dates and group size and we'll build the trip around them, in writing, before you commit to anything.
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