What not to do when you see a bear

Today, a few of us decided to go look for some bears! There is a large clearing by the nearby river where you can go watch them from a safe distance. However, being the inquisitive University folks we are we decided to walk up the logging road to see if we could get a better look! There were four of us in the group, the adventurous Joy and Marten decided to walk down a steep hill from the road to go get a look at one of the bears in the meadow, while the sandal clad Rachel and height fearing Salimah decided to stay on the road. While Joy and Marten were observing the field bear, Rachel and Salimah started singing camp songs! Whilst they were singing "The Bumblebee Song," a look of fear fell upon Rachel's face. Salimah turned to look in Rachel's direction to face a big black bear 30 feet away! The details of the next part are fuzzy, but Rachel (or Salimah) dove into the woods down the hill towards Joy and Marten (who had the bear spray). Salimah yelling "Bear! Bear spray!" the whole way down. The other bear in the meadow turned to look at Joy and Marten, but luckily it did not really care. Once Salimah and Rachel got to the meadow the group was in an interesting predicament, with one bear in the meadow staring at us, and another on the road out of sight. We were literally trapped. Well not really...

Joy took up the CHALLENGE and walked up the hill first (bear spray in hand). Luckily the bear had left when we got to the top.

When we got back to the lodge and recounted the story, our instructors did not find our tale so amusing. Evidently when you encounter a bear the last thing you should do is run. You are actually supposed to make yourself as tall as possible and let the bear know you are there! This was actually explained to us that morning, however, our flight instinct overcame us.

Well, the experience for us was very valuable, not only did we have a close encounter, and the adrenaline was great, but we also learned what not to do next time we go on a bear search!

All joking aside, this is one of the great things about learning in an outdoor environment. As a group we've had 5 encounters with bears on this trip, something that would never occur in any other learning environment. As Enviromental Studies students, its very special to have these encounters with such magnificent and beautiful animals which are very much threatened by encroaching development.