Beau Bright

CLOSE ENCOUNTERS

By Beau Bright

There is one substantial disadvantage to traveling solo in places like Yellowstone: you have no one to hike with. Knowing how dangerous it can be to hike alone with all the wildlife around, I spent my first few days in Yellowstone not straying too far from the roads. A big part of me really did want to go out and explore though.

I finally got to talking with some people, and they encouraged me to go hiking and not worry too much about the wildlife saying, “They’ll hear you coming and avoid you before you even know they’re there.” So the next day, I packed up my backpack, grabbed my bear spray, and headed up a trail.

The trail was fairly unforgiving, but I made it to the top without any incidents. I enjoyed the views, took some pictures, and started to head back down. I can’t explain why, but I stopped for about 5 minutes to watch some other hikers on a path below where I was. Creepy, right? Not my intention, but I did it for some reason! I continue down the trail, and I hear the herd of bison in the valley below making distressed noises I hadn’t heard them make before. Sure enough, maybe 150 yards to my right was a huge male grizzly bear walking away from the trail. Since he was walking away from me, I took my time and got some pictures until he disappeared.

But when I reached the parking lot I learned something that terrified me. A crowd had gathered and I asked them if they had seen the bear. Their response was, “Yes! We weren’t sure you had!” Turns out the bear had come from the other side of the trail and crossed it. Then it hits me: if I hadn’t creepily stopped and watched those hikers for 5 minutes, I might have crossed right in front of this bear’s path. I narrowly avoided having an even crazier story to tell, and I’m alright with that.

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