Bear Necessities

I've been lax in posting stuff but it's easy to get distracted by the Maori blond even at 12,000 km distance. I was nearly eaten by a bear last weekend. Friday we went to Whistler where the 2010 Winter Games are going to be held and Tom and Laurel (his girlfriend) did a 5-Peaks race – 11km at altitude on shingle mountain track. How stupid is that? Anyway Laurel fell and her knees are now huge, discoloured and painful and Tom came in third in his age group which pissed him off but he was wearing brand new shoes and had to drill a hole in his big toe nail to relive the pressure from blood blisters. He should know better.

On the gondola on the way up we saw a bear and on the way down we saw two!

Then, on the Sunday afternoon we were driving back down the Sea-to-Sky Highway when I saw some wonderful moss-covered rocks which would make a terrific photo if you got down at ground level and took a shot across the top of them with a small aperture so even the far away ones were in focus. So we turn round and drive forever to find how we could turn around again then park illegally so I can climb down the baking to get to the rocks. Just as I was about to start climbing down I saw a bear! A bloody big bear (click on the image to see how big it was!). A black bear feeding on some rubbish. My camera was still in my bag so I had to hurriedly get it out and the lens attached. While I was doing that it saw me and started ambling away so the only shot I got was the one attached. What if I’d climbed down and not seen it? What if it had seen me? What if I looked more tasty that rubbish?

So I couldn’t go down the bank in case it came back; you would have had to bury my eaten remains!!!!!