We hiked along a glacier carved ridge high above the surrounding river valleys. 12.86 miles (thankfully most level or down hill), big horn sheep, mountain goats, marmots, a wonderfully rustic stone chalet that still can be rented for overnight bunkhouse style housing for hikers.
Today we saw what we thought was a grizzly bear. We opened up a bunch of the past pictures just to be sure and guess what, we still aren’t sure. Some of the others might have been black grizzly bears. Hmmm, some wilderness folk we are. We took the pictures to the Ranger today and she confirmed, no grizzlies among them. Generally, we give them all a lot of respect and a lot of room but awe will be watching a little more carefully to see if future encounters include any grizzlies. I think we could tell them apart after her min tutorial. We shall see.
We were nearing the end of a hike and I grumbled a little because we hadn’t seen any wildlife. We were little tired so our talking and singing to the bears was not as vehement as earlier. Not a good plan it seems. We rounded a corner on what was really a fairly busy trail and there he stood; seemingly as surprised to see us an we him. Really not the best of all ways to meet but he gave ground quickly and took off through the woods.
Taken along the Alderson Carthew hike
The berries are definitely on and the bears are making the most of it. We saw four of them busily munching away as we drove around the park today. We strolled a couple lakeside trails and relaxed along the shore of Waterton Lake. It was a nice quiet day. As we headed home there was a deerjam all about a doe and her fawn who seemed to think the only good browsing was off the side of a bridge.
We met a black bear on the trail! He was beautiful. A pretty good sized adult that was glossy black with a little brown on the muzzle. We were with a fairly good sized group and a number of them had pepper spray; plus, the bear was really well behaved. We made noise and he ambled on up the mountain away from us. The perfect encounter.
The bear encounter sort of overshadowed what was already an overall great hike.
Alpine hillsides blanketed in wildflowers and heather in bloom.
Magnificent mountain ridges with glaciers and dotted with lakes.
Mountian goats
Big horn sheep
Marmots
Columbia ground squirrels
Ptarmagin (a mom and her clutch)
12 ½ miles. Some icy snow patches. Lots of switchbacks on loose scree. Plenty of singing to the bears. We are tired but glad we made the trek.
We went on a ranger guided hike up Mt Sulfur to about 7500 feet. There were magnificent views and bright clear sky.
We saw elk though.
Tell me, how do you combine the need for near silent approach of birding with the need to make lots of noise to not surprise bears? We are still trying to figure all that out.
A group of young and cows were just noshing away oblivious
or at least uncaring of the people around them.
More pics of course.
The Johnson Canyon trail starts out on a series of catwalks suspended off the gorge wall. It makes for a unique perspective on the stone carving of the creek below. There
was even a walkway through a tunnel cut by the creek long ago. We stood in the spray. Upstream we came upon these pools they call inkpots. The spring water comes up in the bottom of shallow pools and creates all sorts of odd currents that move the fine glacier flour around in amazing patterns.
Cool.