Tundra immersion Best for:

Landscapes, wildlife and sub-arctic experiences

ROUTE: Travelling to Churchill is impossible by road, and while the rail line from Manitoba gives a rich insight into the vastness of northern Manitoba, the route was inoperable due to flood damage (see viarail.ca for updates) at the time of press. The other way is to fly, with Calm Air (calmair.com) running a year-round service between Winnipeg and Churchill (two hours). WHY GO? Churchill is synonymous with wildlife. Polar bears step ashore in mid-june as the ice melts, though are best seen Oct to Nov, and beluga whales return to the river in summer (mid-jun–mid-sep).

June sees the first few polar bears stagger on land as the ice in the bay breaks up. Buggy tours (frontiersnorth.com; Jul– Aug; Oct–nov) across the tundra and tidal flats in late summer and early winter reveal bears, caribou and Arctic fox in the wild.

Summer also sees 50,000 Beluga whales arrive at Churchill River. They come to breed and feed; tours to see them run from July to August. Hop on a Zodiac to get up close – you can even don a drysuit and swim with them.

There are plenty of year-round sights, too. Churchill may be home to fewer than 1,000 people, but talks and films about the area are given almost every evening at Parks Canada or the historic St Paul’s Anglican Church, with its memorials to Arctic explorers.

The town’s Eskimo Museum offers further insight, but for a vivid evocation of the days of the Hudson’s Bay Co. and the Anglo-french rivalry over the fur trade, be sure to visit the town’s 18th-century Prince of Wales Fort.

Fast & the furry Late autumn is the best time to see polar bears in Churchill, when they leave their summer habitat to hunt seals on the ice