Well, I’m slowly getting my legs back under me – been a while since a run has knocked me this hard. It has been said the recovery period after an ultra is just a forced sanity check to reconsider recent decisions. Note, Linda always sends me off with “Make good choices” knowing good and well I’ve probably already made 5 bad decision in the time it took her to tell me that. On the bright side, there is a comforting sense of knowing I could probably outrun any “breathing” danger that might await me on my runs (assumption roots do not have noses). Just in case, there are always friends around I could kneecap if I needed extra get-a-way time. Don’t feel bad for them, they are thinking the exact same thing – I imagine the amusement a Bear would have if it walked out onto our trail and saw the lot of us whacking each other with hiking poles and making overt suggestions regarding who might be tastier. Speaking of humor and unexpected wildlife encounters, I know the perfect post for today and it comes courtesy of Brad’s recent drop of new adventures. While I continue to rest and ponder some of those recent decision, we’ll let Brad lead us down the trail.
Remember…”Make good choices”…
There were two old guys, probably Wildlife Intrigued retirees, sitting on the porch at a retirement home. Each had a quilt on their laps and a shawl around their shoulders, happily rocking away in the August sunshine. There was a long-forgotten elbow brace sitting nearby. Nothing is said for what seems like forever. Then Old Guy (OG) #1 says, “I saw a bear once.”
“Where did you see a bear?” OG#2 asks somewhat incredulously.
“One day when I was hiking in the woods. It just jumped out of the brambles and stared at me,” says OG#1.
“It just jumped out of the woods? What did it do then?” questions OG#2.
“It went Grrrrr!” replies OG#1. (imagine a menacing growl)
“What did you do then?” quizzed OG#2.
“I s#!t my pants!” says OG#1 sheepishly.
“I would too if a bear jumped out of the woods, looked at me and went Grrrrr!” says OG#2 sympathetically.
“No, I mean right now when I went Grrrrr!”
(This joke was brought to you courtesy of my father-in-law. I think it’s one of his favorites.)
Well, that nearly happened to Jan and I. Except for the old guy part, the rocking chairs at the retirement home, and no quilts or shawls were involved. Our pants stayed clean, too. We were in the woods though.
Hit the jump to read more details about this Sequoian sized encounter!
Jan and I were on a leisurely hike on Tall Trees Trail in Sequoia National Park when we came upon two other hikers being very quiet and staring off into the woods. They gave us the universal symbol to be quiet (index finger held up to their lips) and then mouthed the word “Bear!”.
Sure enough, about 100 feet away, to the right of the trail, was a medium-sized bear working its way through the late summer berries. At first glance, the bear was brown. And at second, third and fourth glances as well. Not knowing bears very well, my first thought ran to grizzlies. But also knowing we were in Southern California (SoCal), there are no grizzlies. Turns out it was an American Black Bear (Ursus americanus). In SoCal, black bears spend so much time in the sun that their black fur turns brown from sun bleaching. Gnarly, I know. We watched it for a few moments, not really sure if we were a safe distance away or not.
A rule of thumb we heard from a ranger talk is that if you can hold up your thumb at arm’s length and you can cover the animal, you are at a safe distance. I think my full palm might have covered the bear at this point, but certainly not my thumb. Something else a park ranger had said came to mind: If it’s black, fight back — if it’s brown, lay down — if it’s white, good night.
The four of us gathered there kept watching out of curiosity and just a little bit of fear. We slowly walked backwards a few feet further down the trail, but not really far enough. The bear seemed to become disinterested in more berries, or had eaten them all (we didn’t check that closely) and it wandered deeper into the woods. Or so we thought. Jan hiked back up the trail to warn the people a couple hundred yards behind us that there was a bear in the area.
Not thirty seconds after she left us, there was a crashing through the underbrush. The noise wasn’t because the bear was moving quickly, it was simply not very quiet about walking. Then I saw it a few yards off the trail near where we had been standing. I wasn’t really sure what to do at that point with a black bear only about 50 feet away. Then I remembered Jan was due to be walking back right about then so I shouted “Jan, Stop!”
As Jan heard me shout “Stop!” she had just rounded a corner on the path. A couple of seconds later, the bear walks out of the brush, about 25 feet in front of her.
Like any good photographer she starts clicking off photos. Then she holds out her arm to stop the people walking up behind her.
I, at the “much safer” distance of 50 feet, am also taking photos as fast as I can. The bear was moving at a good clip, perpendicular to the path we were standing on, crossing directly between Jan and I.
Jan was just behind the tree on the right of this photo when she took the shot two photos above. It was headed for the succulent treats waiting in the meadow across the path. The bear made its way to the meadow, squeezing between two sequoia “seedling” trees.
No time for detours here.
Once it reached its new treats, it seemed perfectly content and completely ignored the humans with, or without, cameras.
Once we came to our senses (our thumbs still would not have covered the bear) we decided to continue down the trail, AWAY from the bear. We also remembered that there was a ranger giving a talk near the start/end of the trail. When we reached the end, sure enough, the ranger was still there with her tour group. We interrupted and said something like, “Sorry to interrupt, but there’s a bear on the trail about 100 yards from here.” Instead of showing concern for a bear being around people, she asked the group, “Who wants to see a bear?” All of their hands went up immediately. Then she said, “Let’s go,” and off they went. The ranger obviously knew something we didn’t know about that particular bear.
Jan and I continued to the parking lot, a bit more vigilant than we had been just a few moments earlier. Where there’s one small-medium sized bear, there are sure to be more. This one must have been a first year, on its own for the first time. We were worried about a momma bear coming out of the woods, but heard and saw nothing after that. I can say we did walk a bit quicker to the car than we had been on the hike around the meadow.
We’ve reached the end.
I also want to say we can answer the quintessential question, “Does a bear poop in the woods?” We have photographic evidence of said poop, seeds and all.
Thank you for reading. If you want to see more bear photos from our SW National Park tour, please visit here.
Credits
Thanks again to Jan for proofreading and editing. Allyson is on assignment. Thanks to Jan for many of the photos in this article.
Life Intrigued 