I was hiking in the Grand Tetons. The snow was still melting and I was watching my step on the trail.
At some point I see a backpack next to the trail. I look around, I see nobody. I hear a PSST and a bush is moving.
A fellow hiker signals me from the bush. I approach and he shows me a baby grizzly bear foraging!
It was my first grizzly encounter. It turns out I walked 3 feet close to the baby. I didn’t know it.
The other hiker told me he saw everything and was prepared to make some noise or anything in case of an event, but didn’t make a move as long as everything was calm.
The baby wasn’t a real threat (or so I still think).
But the question “Where is mamma bear” came to mind pretty quickly. That’s when I turned ghostly pale.
I walked away and warned all incoming hikers. Nothing happened, but I was 3 ft away from a baby grizzly bear. What a moment! 🙂
I see I can upload a picture, but I don’t have it handy (I do have it though, from the bush where the other hiker PSSSTed me from.
During the same vacation I came close with two other (black) bears, but not this close and also with no incidents.
Comment from Anonymous
You were very lucky to get out of there alive.
Comment from BubbaDan2
that was close did you ever see the momma or was the cub lost?
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Climbing a Tree In Yellowstone to Escape a Charging Grizzly Bear
Yellowstone Veteran
In early June 1983 me and two friends walked across the lower loop in Yellowstone. We had reached Alum Creek, we continued walking about 45 minutes. We crested a small knoll overlooking the creek and down Hayden Valley.
We saw the sow and her two cubs down below along the creek about 1/4 mile away. We decided that was a great place to have lunch. We sat in the shade of a couple pine trees and watched the cubs sliding in the snow and playing in the creek while mama griz lazed. 20 minutes later we’re ready to move on.
We had just put our backs on and were taking a last look at the bears, when the sow stands on her hind legs and looks right at us. We freeze and less than 10 seconds later the bear is charging at us. I follow one of my buddies up a pine tree and my other friend climbs up another.
The bear races to the top of the knoll, circles our tree sniffing at the base. She moves to the other tree stands with her paws on the tree and snorts at my friend. She turns and runs back down to her cubs. We stay up in the trees and watch as the bear family moves up over a small ridge on the other side of the creek.
What impressed me the most aboud the whole episode:
1. We climbed those trees in less than 15 seconds.
2. The bear smelled awful.
3. From the time the sow started runing at us till the time she got back to her cubs… less than two minutes.
4. We didn’t come down out of those trees for another twenty minutes.
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