In 2009, long-time WWF volunteer Wanda Hall won the Earth Hour contest and traveled to Churchill with Frontiers North Adventures to see polar bears and other wildlife.
Wanda has travelled far and wide to see animals in the wild, but she said that this trip in particular, getting to see polar bears in their natural environment, made her realize how important it is that we decrease our footprint on the earth.
Wanda also happens to be the gal behind WWF’s panda mascot. Read all about Wanda’s adventure as the WWF panda mascot meeting Frontiers North polar bear. http://blog.wwf.ca/blog/2010/07/20/why-i-volunteer-wanda-hall/
We’re thrilled to know that Wanda had such a great experience with us in Churchill.
Yesterday we showed you some great street-level imagery used by the Canadian Tourism Commission (CTC) in New York City to promote Canada, including polar bears in Churchill. Here is another example of how the CTC has worked towards accomplishing their goal of increased awareness of Canada in Germany. The image below shows a billboard that was displayed in the Spring of 2008 in Frankfurt, Germany. The billboard was located in very high traffic area on the “Zeil“, right in the heart of Frankfurt. The area is home to high-end fashion boutiques and department stores with many pedestrians and tourists in the area each day.
According to Global Tourism Watch (2008), with one in five mentions, “Canada” ranks third among the long-haul destination brands identified by Germans on an unaided basis. “Australia” and “the US” are the two top brands, with each mentioned by just under a third of German travellers. The CTC has done a tremendous job promoting Canada in Germany, especially our Tundra Buggy Adventures in Churchill. We look forward to seeing their next big advertising campaign.
We have a great working relationship with the Canadian Tourism Commission. A couple years ago, we hosted one of their film and photography crews up in Churchill to capture some great promotional images and video. One particular image of a polar bear leaning on our Tundra Buggy has been utilized by the CTC in major billboard and magazine campaigns all over the world. The latest is a great campaign in Manhattan to grab New Yorkers attention about Canada as a vacation destination.
The fronts of three Manhattan stores were wrapped with huge vinyl wallpapers covered by engaging imagery illustrations of unique Canadian experiences – one of which was the large polar bear and Tundra Buggy image with the following question as a headline: Does polar bear breath smell like fish?
Check out the image below of the wallpaper and this article that further explains the campaign!
FNA Polar Bears in Churchill guest, Amanda Bunyan, is now a bit of a celebrity in the United Kingdom. She shared with us a photo she took on our adventure that was featured in the March issue of Lonely Planet Magazine. The photo was in an article called ‘Postcards’, where the magazine features reader-captured photographs with a short story about where the image was taken and what’s happening. Amanda and her mother travelled with us this past autumn on our Tundra Buggy Lodge Enthusiast-level adventure.
To help CBS celebrate Earth Day 2010, we teamed up with The Price is Right to offer one lucky contestant an opportunity to win a trip to Churchill, Manitoba (not quite the Arctic Circle) to experience wild polar bears on a Tundra Buggy Adventure!
Watch Edward from Minnesota exhibit more energy than an atom bomb attempt to solve ‘Pick a Pair’ and join us this autumn!
Our 2010 Northern Lights & Winter Nights adventure has officially come to an end. We first would like to extend a big thank you to Travel Manitoba and the Canadian Tourism Commission for supporting and helping coordinate our fantastic media guests on our adventure. The trip was definitely a huge success!
We had a great week. We made many new friends and had a blast. The stars aligned for our evening Tundra Buggy excursions across the frozen Churchill River, where we experienced amazing northern lights viewing. Also, our snowshoeing adventure with our friend Mike Macri, our experience at the start line of the Hudson Bay Quest and dogsledding excursion with Blue Sky Mush were all excellent.
A key message we sent home with our Northern Lights & Winter Nights guests is that the community of Churchill and tour operators know tourism and are successful at delivering world-class service when thousands of guests visit during October and November for polar bears. The cool part about visiting Churchill in March for northern lights, dog-sledding and snow shoeing — essentially the “off-season” — is that our group alone were able to benefit from the knowledge and experience of Churchill’s tourism professionals on a more intimate level.
Here are some images that we took of the adventure!
This past Autumn we had the pleasure of hosting some of our Winnipeg industry partners up in Churchill to experience a full-day Tundra Buggy Adventure, and to also help us honour Debby the Polar Bear by Gordon Point. Justin Gagnon and Carly Thompson of Anvil Digital (the agency that created our amazing 3D rendering of Tundra Buggy One featured on our Tundra Buggy website) joined us and put together this great video blog of their experience with us. Check it out!
Most people know Churchill for its amazing polar bear viewing and Tundra Buggy adventures in October and November. But what a lot of people don’t know is that in July and August not only are there 3,000 beluga whales in the Churchill River, but there is still an opportunity to see polar bears on our summer Tundra Buggy adventures – just not in the numbers that you would see in autumn. Pair all this with witnessing brilliant colours of flora on the tundra, unique birding and wildlife viewing, Churchill is a very inspiring place to be in the summer months.
Take a look at some images that our summer Tundra Buggy Driver and Tundra Buggy Lodge Maintenance guru, Dave Allcorn, took during his summer months in Churchill in 2009:
One of our highlights after “Polar Bear Season” is receiving images and video that our guests captured on our Polar Bears in Churchill Adventures. We were very happy to hear from Diana Davidson, a guest on our Photo Specialist level Tundra Buggy Lodge Adventure led by professional photographer Richard Day, who was nice enough to share with us two fun photos of her group in front of a Tundra Buggy. Look at all the camera gear! That’s some serious photography.
FYI – 2010 Polar Bears Season is only 220 days away!
