On this particular trip, I never got especially close to any bears. The one fairly early in the video was behind a ridge and smelled me before we saw each other, and proceeded straight up the slope after that. He was maybe 75 yards away. All the rest were well over 100 yards away. Kodiak bears are hunted pretty regularly and have a healthy fear of humans. They will generally clear out given the chance. Many of the bears never saw me as I passed through, or figured I was too far away to react to. This is in stark contrast to mainland coastal brown bears in Katmai NP which are not hunted and are by and large totally used to having humans around and basically ignore you as if you were an inanimate object. That's great for bear watching, but also pretty weird. Kodiak is statistically speaking a very safe place to be around bears. I still carry bear spray and take the normal precautions.
The holes in the tundra are bear tracks that have been established by the passing of thousands of bears over the course of thousands of years. Along ridges or over passes, the bears somehow all assume the same gait and will step directly into the same paw holes, establishing deep divots in the ground. It must be awkward for especially small or large bears to adhere to this odd behavior and step into holes that don't match their normal strides, and I have never heard an explanation for what purpose it serves. Most low spots on ridges will have just such a bear trail running perpendicular to the ridge over its top, often crossing at right angles to another bear trail running parallel along the ridge top. I have even seen this phenomenon in the spruce forests along heavily traveled trails.
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