A Photographer Spent 117 Hours In The Severe Cold To Get These Incredible Shots

Every year, from mid-February to mid-March, a grand event happens in the Wapusk National Park in Canada: polar bears come out from their caves with their four-month-old babies for the first time.

Gilardini started photographing the spirit bears in B.C.'s Great Bear Rainforest after she moved to Vancouver five years ago. "I am totally fascinated by this complex ecosystem where everything is interconnected and I feel deeply grateful to be among the few people who have been privileged to see and photograph it," she said. She said her guide called this sleeping bear Mushroom, because it liked to get "high on mushrooms," she said with a laugh.