A Near "Bear" Experience

This is a guest blog by Ken. I need to preface this with a saying that I used to always say " I only run when something bigger than me is chasing me..." Thats a stupid saying now.

This event happened on thursday, September 4th at 4pm. Sorry it took so long to publish this.

It all started when we where in Yellowstone on our family vacation. Michael and I wanted to take a break from family time and decided to go fishing. We were told of a lake with great fishing that was 3.5 miles off the beaten path and that very few people venture out there. We were very dissapointed. We hiked out to Grebe Lake and on the way to the Lake we passed 10 people who were leaving. When we got there we found three people fishing. They also had a dual jogging stroller with two infants bundled inside trying to stay warm.

We fished for an hour and decided to leave after not having a single sign of a fish in the entire lake. We hiked back to the road and passed another two people heading for the lake. For a lake that was seldom fished, we certainly saw alot of people! I would hate to see a heavily fished lake... We were moving very fast and I was out of breath (elevation). We did not talk or make much noise as we hurried through the woods. If Kelly was with us, she would have been in song the entire way to avoid any misfortunate confrontations. She is the smart one of the family. I Always thought seeing a bear in the woods would be a great experience. Another saying I used to always say was " anything for a picture". I usually always have my camera strapped to my hip for a great memory shot.

We made it 3/4 of the way back to our car when Michael notices that a small bear was ahead of us in the trail coming towards us. The bear was a small grizzly, most likely a very old cub or a young adult. On all fours it stood about waist high. The rangers later estimated it around 200lbs. It was ahead of us by about 50 yds. When it saw us it stopped and stared. Then a second bear poked his head around the first to see what was in the trail. Two siblings. When seeing this we began to start finding ways to avoid any contact with these bears. We looked away and started to walk backwords down the trail. The bears started to huff and slap the ground with their paws as a warning. We decided to get off the trail and stepped into a strand of young pine trees which was a bad move. When we took one step off the trail, both bears decided to charge. I did not want to confront bears in such a dense stand of trees and so we also began to run. We ran a total of 30 feet or so through thick pines, hurdling stumps and fallen trees. I do have to say that is the fastest I have ever run. When I turned to look behind me both bears have made up the 50 yards and were mere feet behind me. I ran out of the pines into a meadow and dove to the ground. I no longer wanted to be chased. I covered my head and said the fastest prayer in my life. It was less than a second before both bears emerged from the trees. Then came the strangest thing. Seeing us lying on the ground, they both stopped, turned and ran back through the trees breaking branches as they left. Their reaction looked as if they were scared by us lying in the grass instead of being easy targets. I was expecting a bit more contact than that at this point, but up till now I was never afraid. The fear kicked in when the thought that the momma bear was out there somewhere and we did not see her. The two little bears could have killed us, but didn't. If there was a momma bear present we would have certainly had a different outcome. When we finally continued our hike to the car we decided to make as much noise as possible.

I never got a picture. It is hard to pull the camera, press the start button and position the camera when sprinting through the trees. I didn't have enough experience in this situation to get the camera out. Sorry.

Next time I decide to hike in the woods for a little fishing, I will remember the bear spray.