The bathing bear

“Did you see where that grizzly had been digging along the trail?” I said to the guy who was now hiking in front of us.

The guy didn’t seem too impressed by my tracking skills. He kinda shrugged and sorta wondered whether it was even a bear.

We were hiking up the Gunsight Pass Trail to Sperry Chalet.

The guy had overtaken us when we stopped to take a picture and was now in front of us.

“The last time I was on this trail I had a film camera,” he remarked.

We came to a switchback and I just happened to turn around and there it was: A big furry grizzly, walking right behind us. Maybe 40 feet away. Maybe a little more. Maybe a little less.

“I told you that was a grizzly digging up the trail,” I said.

We got out of the way in a hurry, going up the trail on top of the next switchback.

I threw a couple of rocks in its direction and we waved and hollered and the bear went off into the woods, or what was left of it, for the time being.

The Sprague Fire burned over this area last summer and it looked like a nuclear bomb had gone off. All the trees were black, but the brush was popping up here and there, lush from the new nutrients in the soil.

“Watch,” I said to the guy. “That bear will end up back on the trail in front of us. He doesn’t want to walk in that crap anymore than we do.”

I was right. We went a switchback or two up the trail and sure enough, there was Mr. Griz, ambling in front of us.

At least we knew where he was. Having a griz behind you is one thing. Having it front of you, is another. It’s always better to be looking at bear butt than bear teeth.

We kept sight of the griz on and off for a good half hour. It would stop and dig up some roots or get a drink and we would stop a good distance away, giving it plenty of space.

But then it hopped off into the woods and we thought: There it goes. Gone for good.

We ran into some other folks who had also seen the bear and we chatted it up a while and then headed back up the trail.

That’s when a lady in back said, “The griz, it’s back on the trail again.”

Sure enough, up came the grizzly, minding its own business, but not far away, either.

Certainly not the 100 yards away the Park says you’re supposed to stay away from a bear. But the regs don’t say what to do when the bear comes up to you … So collectively, we decided to just get off the trail entirely, get up high and out of the way and let the bear pass.

There was about eight of us, and we figured if the bear really wanted to attack anyone, it would have done it long ago.

The plan worked perfectly. We got up off the trail. The bear walked by … and then went down into the creek right in front of us … and took a bath.

It even stuck its head all the under as it soaked in a bathtub-sized pool of frigid cold Sperry Glacier water.

There was no getting by the bear. Its bathing spot was right next to the foot bridge over the creek. It soaked there like a submarine. So we waited it out.

(The bridge and a tree were in the way, which made it tough to see the bruin. If someone had come down the trail, they would have nearly stepped on its head.)

It was one hot bear. How long does it take a griz to take a bath? About 10 minutes, give or take.

It then ambled out of the water and lumbered up the snow toward the chalet and likely well beyond — I last saw its tracks heading toward Lincoln Pass, another 500 vertical feet up the mountain, a beautiful bruin, making life in these tough old hills look easy. Chris Peterson is the editor of the Hungry Horse News.