Outsmarting the bears

It's ever so portant how you walk.
And it's ever so jolly to call out, "Bears,
Just watch me walking in all the squares."

--A. A. Milne

I returned last night from a four-day visit to Glacier National Park.  It was the first time I'd visited Glacier since a family vacation when I was ten.  It didn't disappoint.

Glacier is a hiker's park par excellence.  And the Many Glacier region of the park where I stayed is a center of some of the best hiking in the park.  Unfortunately, June -- especially this June -- is not the best month for hiking.  Glacier Park is at a high elevation and at a high latitude, and the snow lingers.  This year, especially, when three or four weeks of unseasonable blizzards immediately before my arrival had tied up transportation in the park. 

The Going-to-the-Sun Road -- the sole west-east traffic artery through the park -- still  has not opened to through traffic, and may not for another couple of weeks.  To reach Many Glacier -- in the northeast portion of the park -- I had to take U.S. 2, a lower altitude route which skirts the southern boundary of the park, from my airport in Missoula.

Once at my destination, and checked into the Many Glacier Hotel -- built a hundred years ago, before the park had been created, by the Great Northern Railway -- I had a number of fine hiking options open to me.  But none that went above a certain altitude, where the trails were still covered by melting but unstable snow fields. 

But the primary obstacle to successful hiking was not meteorological, but psychological.  The Park Service distributes literature raving about the beauty and quality of its hiking trails.  It also warns prominantly -- both in literature and on trail signs, about the danger of bears.

Entering Grizzly Country

You are entering a wilderness area and must accept certain inherent dangers, including snow, steep terrain, water and wildlife.  There is no guarantee of your safety. 

Bears have injured and killed visitors and may attack without warning and for no apparent reason.

(Emphasis in original)  This was by no means the most alarming of the warnings I encountered, merely the one I happened to photograph.  Hikers were strongly urged not to hike alone, and to make a considerable racket on the trail to warn bears of one's approach:  talk loudly, sing, clap one's hands, etc. 

I had arrived at the park alone, and had every intention of hiking -- if at all -- alone.  My inherent good breeding, as well as my inhibitions, precluded my behaving in the loud and uncouth manner suggested by the National Park Service.  Was I thus doomed to spend my time on the hotel deck -- basking in the warm sun, reading, gazing at the awe-inspiring scenery, and sipping yet another "Going-to-the Sun" IPA?

Certainly not.

The Park Service suggested -- as a supplement, not a replacement, to the above admonitions -- that the prudent hiker carry a cannister of "bear spray."  I don't believe I had ever heard of "bear spray," but it certainly exists and is available for purchase at local outdoors shops.  Carrying it into bear country is as reasonable as a young secretary's decision to carry a can of Mace into her dark parking garage when working late at night.  In fact, the similarities are innumerable.

Suitably armed with a $49.95 can of bear spray, capable of propelling a reassuring seven-second cloud of pain and confusion some thirty yards in front of me -- a cloud that would instantly cause a bear to lose interest in pursuing me as either prey or an object of fun and amusement -- I felt, if not invincible, at least more confident.  Spencer Tracy did not walk the lonesome streets of Black Rock without a weapon in his holster; nor would I walk into the grizzlies' lair without my cannister of bear spray hanging from my belt, armed and ready to fire. 

I now understand the hitherto seemingly peculiar psychology of the NRA's hordes of devotees.  When confronting a bear, one can purchase manhood for $49.95.

The Many Glacier Hotel sits on the southern shore of Swiftcurrent Lake, and on Friday I did a warm-up hike, 2.6 miles, on a tourist-oriented nature trail circling the lake.  The hiking was fun, and no bears -- either grizzly or the more amenable black -- threatened my life or limb.

The next day, I hiked to the western end of the lake, walked across an isthmus to neighboring Josephine, and proceeded along the northern shore of that long lake.  About half way along the shore, a side trail begins the climb to the Grinnell glacier.  The park ranger had earlier warned not to proceed beyond the point, about two miles in, where the trail was obliterated by late snow, and so far as I could tell no hikers were disregarding that warning.  From the high point on the trail, one had excellent views of the glacier and of Grinnell Lake below, the beneficiary of the melting snow and ice from the glacier -- water that cascaded down to the lake by numerous spectacular waterfalls.

Although I was disappointed -- with bear spray at the ready -- to encounter no ursine threats, I did run into (almost literally) a big-horned sheep grazing on the trail.  He obviously was more familiar with human hikers than I was with animals with curling horns; we watched each other for a while, and then squeezed past each other on the narrow trail.  I had no cause to visit fiery hell upon the calm animal, through an inappropriate blast of my precious bear spray.

Having returned to the Lake Josephine trail, I continued to the west end of the lake.  At this point, there is a dock maintained by a concessionaire who operates a boat service from the hotel.  For a mere $24, one can cruise the length of Swiftcurrent, undertake a quarter mile portage (of oneself, not the boat) to Josephine, and climb aboard a waiting vessel that takes you to this western end of the lake.  And returns you, in reverse order, to the hotel.  Most of the cruisers appeared of a certain age, and perhaps not ready even for easy lakeshore hiking.

Another mile took me to Grinnell Lake, with its view of the many waterfalls from the glacier.  I had pictured myself sprawled on a lakeshore meadow, blissfully eating my mid-day sandwich.  The last portion of the trail, however, passed through snow, and the snow continued right down to the lake's edge.  I still blissfully ate my sandwich, but necessarily used my daypack as insulation between my rear and the cold, wet ground.

The entire day's hiking covered about eleven miles.  Other than the moderate climb up the Grinnell glacier trail, the hiking was all on level lakeside trails (in a few places flooded by high lake levels, necessitating minor detours), and I returned to the hotel not really feeling as though I had covered that much distance.

The only bears I saw were tiny dots on a cliff, high above the hotel.  Every morning, tourists stood on the hotel's deck, staring at the dots.  Some claim they saw them move.  A ranger assured us they were bears. 

The very threat of the sight of my bear spray appears to have successfully kept the beasts at bay.

I took some great photos, which nevertheless hardly do justice to the beauties of the surrounding alpine mountains.  A very enjoyable long weekend, but next time I'll do it a few weeks later in the summer.
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  A sample of my photos of the park can be viewed by clicking here.