Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park World Heritage site.

Salamander
Wed 21 Aug 2019 19:10


We spent longer in the USA Glacier National Park than we have in any of the others. This park is as close to pristine wilderness as you can get with a human presence and this is borne out by the healthy population of grizzly and brown bears. It is illegal to approach the bears to within 100ft, unfortunately the bears take no notice of the regulations and like to use the same trails as us humans. On our way to Triple Divide Pass (so called because a hand's width on the adjacent peak determines which of three oceans a drop of water will go to) we sat down to have a drink on a very comfy log. As Caroline looked up she found herself thinking, 'what a pretty bear face', then, 'oh shit, it's a grizzly'. Followed by 'what enormous claws' as the grizzly approached; 'oh shit we'd better get out of here'. In no time at all the bear had moved 30ft closer to us. We used the natural curve of the path to get out of sight and made noise so that hopefully the bear would go. This close an encounter meant no photographs, just get out of there.

Murray had noticed a strange noise, almost like walking trousers rustling rhythmically and looked to see what was coming. As a muzzle appeared, 'Large dog...shit, wolf... bugger, grizzly, leave', was the thought process, and a realisation that the bear wasn't looking at him, but to his right – at Caroline. The whole time the grizzly never stopped staring at Caroline, something she found most unnerving.

At the divide we couldn't eat lunch as the laziest fattest marmots spent all their time trying to get into our packs. A great long day of walking from our first campsite in Glacier.

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