A few years later, after our kids were willing to appreciate nature at its grandest, we decided to take them to Sequoia National Park, using my father-in-law’s 24-foot trailer. We left the Los Angeles area before dawn to beat the holiday traffic. Hah! It took us four hours merely to get out of town.
Consequently, we arrived late at Sequoia’s entrance, where officials gave us a choice: go back to LA or “camp” in a crowded parking lot. I’m pretty sure we were the last visitors to arrive that evening because we parked the trailer near the edge of that lot.
We didn’t do much to set up camp that evening—just had a quick supper and bedded down for the night in sleeping bags. After the parking lot quieted down, I blearily heard a commotion at the trailer’s door. My oldest daughter got up, turned on her flashlight, and yelled, “Shoo! Scat! … Hey; a bear is trying to get in!”
I’m not sure but suspect I replied helpfully, “Shut up and go back to bed.” Things quieted down, and I drifted off to sleep crabbily.
Actually, I think my daughter scared the bear away. The next morning, she practically dragged me out of the trailer, saying, “Look! I told you a bear tried to get in!”
What she showed me was startling. The bear had dug claw marks into the aluminum frame of the trailer door.
Later that morning, my wife visited a woman at a nearby trailer and remarked on what happened. “Well,” the lady said, “we always sprinkle ammonia around our trailer. Keeps bears away.”
Ann took her advice that evening, generously sprinkling ammonia all around our trailer, pouring what remained in the bottle into a pie plate, which she placed underneath the trailer’s stairway (two steps, really).
That night, our pet bear returned to tackle getting in again. Maybe he brought a chain saw; I’m not sure. But when he got in range of Ann’s ammonia … well, you never heard a more disgusted “Pheww!” He never bothered us again.
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A few years after the Sequoia adventure, about 1978, my family drove to Yosemite National Park in our Ford Club Wagon, towing the tent trailer mentioned in a previous story. We set up camp on the valley floor, near a locale named Happy Isles, as I recall.
After several sightseeing excursions, a day arrived when we decided on an ambitious, though relatively easy hike, starting on a well-marked trail somewhere beyond Glacier Point, elevation 7,214 feet. We drove the Club Wagon up there, and took the hike, largely downhill, ending back at camp. (The next morning, I hopped a bus from the valley floor, returning to Glacier Point to retrieve the Club Wagon.)
The hike we took passed several truly marvelous sites: Illiloutte Falls, Nevada Falls, Silver Apron, Emerald Pool, and Vernal Falls, but I won’t discuss them here. This, after all, is a story about encounters with bears.
Our family (my wife, three children, and me) hiked from Glacier Point for perhaps an hour and a half and reached a promising shady spot with logs to sit on. I went upslope, seeing a log big enough for my broad bottom. The rest of the family found seating near the trail we’d been traipsing.
Making myself comfortable on my log, I took off my hat and set my heavy camera in it, or should I say on it? It was a Minolta SLR (single-lens reflex) with about six inches of lens attached——my pride and joy: a 70-210 Vivitar zoom lens. I fancied myself a photographer, but in truth, was merely a picture taker. That Vivitar allowed me to acquire some dandy pics over the years.
The Minolta wasn’t one of those amazing digital cameras available today; it used photographic film. Mine was loaded with a 36-picture roll of Kodachrome (color) film, and I carried several spare rolls of that film with me on the hike. I mention the film because its fragrance interested bears, as I soon learned.
Having nearly finished a small bag of potato chips and sipped from a canteen of water, I relaxed and enjoyed the scenery downhill—the trail skirting an overlook somewhat visible through pine trees.
Unexpectedly, my wife hollered, “Bill! There’s a bear behind you!”
I assumed she was kidding, trying to scare me, and I pooh-poohed her, but she pressed “No! Really! It’s right behind you!”
The children chimed in, one of them adding, “Look! There’s two bear cubs on that tree over there!”
I turned halfway, and sure enough, could indeed see two cubs. Continuing to turn, I suddenly found myself face-to-face with Mama Bear. She was so close, I could’ve scratched her nose … or she mine.
According to a park ranger we met maybe a half-hour later, I should have stood up, gesticulated wildly, and shouted something like, “You moth-eaten fur ball, get the hell off my mountain!”
Actually what I said, in the most conversational of tones was, “Why, hello there.” You’d have thought I was greeting a long-lost college buddy.
In any case, my statement disconcerted the bear, and she backed up a couple of steps, giving me time to apprehend my danger. Mrs. Bear outweighed me by maybe a hundred pounds and had bigger teeth and claws than I do.
The hair on the back of my neck came to attention as I exuded fear sweat. She approached again, bent down, and began sniffing my camera, no doubt detecting the enticing aroma of Kodachrome film.
To this day, I’m utterly amazed at my reaction: I snatched the camera away, saying, “That’s mine! You can’t have it.” Mama Bear hesitated at my gall, and I grabbed my hat, stood up and started downhill.
I discovered from a nature program years later, that bruins judge a bear standing up to be a threat, an invitation to combat. So, seeing me stand, she took the prudent step, retreating upslope, toward her cubs.
As she backed away, I thought, “A once in a lifetime opportunity. I should take a picture.” Thus, I nervously snapped off a shot at Mama Bear.
Next, I considered (if you consider my panic that mundane), taking a picture of her two cubs, but rejected that idea forthwith, “If I point something at her cubs and—God forbid—click it, she may attack.”
At that point, I retreated to the trail and hastily rejoined my family. We departed a little; looked back, and saw the bear and her cubs clamber down to investigate where we’d snacked. Ever the picture-taker, I steadied myself and took another shot of Mama Bear. Poor lighting rendered the result disappointing. My earlier “snap” shot was much better, though no great shakes.
Because we’d largely consumed the goodies on that trail stop, there wasn’t much left to interest the bears, just a few chips. They soon left, romping up the mountain and out of sight. I was ready to resume our hike when my youngest daughter complained, “We need to go back. I left my water bottle.”
I can’t recall but am pretty sure I replied, “Forget it! I’ll get you a new one when we return to camp.”
My daughter wouldn’t accept that generous offer and protested she wanted the one she’d left. I started to object, but the wife intervened, “Those bears are long gone. Let’s go back and get her bottle.” Her retort demonstrated once again that mama “bears” defend their “cubs.”
As we searched where we’d rested, we picked up the trash left behind: empty potato chip bags, for instance. Then, someone hit pay dirt, finding the water bottle.
Originally it had been a cylindrical plastic bottle. Now it was a flattened freak. Mama Bear had bitten it hard, leaving two holes, its water completely drained. Even so, my daughter put the mangled bottle in her backpack, as if preserving a valued keepsake.
After summer vacation, she returned to school and displayed it to her classmates at a “show and tell.” My young daughter returned home outraged, highly incensed. “They said it was a fake, accused me of poking holes in it with a nail!”
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In some of my stories, I injected a smidgeon of whimsy (okay, okay, I lied my ass off). However, the story of the four bears is as truthful as a well-trampled memory allows.
I used to wonder why bears were so attracted to me. But why not? They recognize a man of great taste.
THE END
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