Day 8

Sofia Wrote:

Awoke to a black bear in camp. It pawed at our bear bags and sat down in front of the tree they were tied to. Dad was throwing sticks and hollering but it didn’t phase the bear. I tried getting up on his shoulders. Also didn’t work. Eventually the bear wandered off a bit and Dad retrieved the bags. Without breakfast, we swiftly packed up and left what we thought might be the bear’s home. We reentered woods, and about 10 minutes into our navigating and tripping over mossy dead growth, I spotted the bear about 15 feet away. “Dad the bear’s back.” We got close and yelled and threw things. Nothing worked. The bear started circling us. Its agility put things into perspective as it lapped us. Dad dispensed a bit of his bear spray but was upwind of the bear. We headed towards another opening and the bear followed us. We put a patch of trees between ourselves and the bear and it continued to run circles around us— running from tree to tree and sometimes stopping and taking steps towards us. Dad dispensed more spray but it ended up mostly in the bushes. There was a moment when I was close enough with a clear shot of the bear, but I wanted to save my spray in case it fully charged. We headed up into more woods, and the bear followed once more. Finally Dad may have gotten some of the spray to drift into the bear’s face. The bear eventually gave and walked away a bit, but I was convinced it would keep following. We stayed close together and continued looking over our shoulders for the next couple hours. Finally we crossed a river and ate breakfast and drank coffee and relaxed a bit. Dad felt better but I wasn’t ready to relax. We reached a confluence of the river then continued to climb through thick forest. Took a break for food in the middle of it. There were so many huckleberries that made the bear situation even more confusing. I felt anxious until we finally emerged from the worst part of “Death Valley.” We then hiked through sparser and less frequent woods. The mountain walls on either side of us were dramatic and filled with waterfalls and glaciers. We continued to pick our way through rhododendron, sometimes choosing to hike up the creek that made my feet immediately go numb. Eventually all greenery disappeared and we found ourselves hiking through talus while the wind funneled down the valley and pelted us. We finally crossed the creek one last time and Dad found us a perfect camp sheltered from the wind by a little hill. We still had an incredible view of these peaks enclosing us— one on each side of the valley. I was particularly fascinated by how the wind forced a couple of the waterfalls to shift mid air. Instead of the water continuing on its path to the ground, it moved sideways like some ephemeral spirit. Best camp ever. 

Camped near GDR 37.3--Magnificent!!