If You Run into a Bear

In the evening, feeling tired and mellow, the talk around the fireplace turns to bears.   There are many black bears in the area, and we have been very careful not to leave anything that would attract them, or their preferred prey, like ground squirrels.

One guide compares black bears to puppies.  Bears are like puppies?  Another points out that black bears can recognize the faces of people they’ve seen before.  Black bears know how to open car trunks (do they use a key, I wonder or....)  Black bears have been known to stalk humans.  I think they’re kidding.  I hope they’re kidding.

At some point in the summer, bears get an internal signal that tells them “Eat more fat; prepare for hibernation.”  Ground squirrels are a good source of fat, and bears dig wildly to get at them.  Dirt and boulders pose no impediment to a fat-frenzied bear.

You can see the rocky edge to this hole dug by a bear who sensed a ground squirrel lurking below... I'm guessing the bear got his prey.

Humans are also a good fat source, although everyone insists there is really no danger.

“So, um, just in case, what should I do if I run into a bear?” I ask.

If I see a bear, I should pull myself up to my full height, raise my arms over my head, and lower my eyes.  “Never make eye contact with a bear because it will see that as threatening and get ticked off,” says a guide. “

This is funny to me, since my “full height” is barely five feet (if I’m on tiptoe). 

“But really,” he continues,   bears are not a threat to humans.” 

I wonder about that.  They’re not a threat? Yet we humans just freeze in a surrender pose with eyes cast downward so we can’t see what the bear is about to do.

I allow my attention to be drawn away from bears to a description of tomorrow’s hike.  We’ll start the day with a hike on Canoe Glacier, and after a BBQ, we’ll head to Moose Meadow.  

View of Canoe Glacier from Lodge

Canoe Glacier is that white area you see up there in the mountains.  Canoe Glacier is, like all glaciers, a river of ice at least a hundred feet thick (possibly much more)  moving its way down the mountain, grinding the earth beneath it.

I’m going to hike on that.  Yup, me.  Up There.  On the glacier.  

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