High Sierra Topix

A humorous bear encounter :

We had made camp along Golden Creek, near the trail junction into Fourth Recess. Had hung our food, this being a little before canisters becoming required (not sure they were even available).

It was the middle of the night, I woke up and heard something moving around near my pack. There was enough moonlight to see that it was too big to be anything but a bear - so I gave a loud yell.

The bear took off out of camp like a shot, but chose a direction that took it through the camp. On the way, it encountered one of my friends sleeping in his Bivy. Went right over him, stepping on his butt.

I had a heck of a time convincing him it was a bear, and that I wasn't just messing with him. I don't think he fully beleived me until the next morning, when we could see tracks, etc.

BTW: My kids scout troop reffered to any kind of rodent as "mini-bears", due to the amount of damage that they can do.

When Pooch was still alive, we were sleeping out in the open, when one morning we were sleeping in and the squirrels were hitting the cones in the trees. I was just laying there on my side with Pooch by my feet, when I heard a little pitter patter then felt something use my hip for a trampoline I guess. I lay there laughing, thinking about what had just happened. Pooch never noticed a thing.

I call bear canisters "bear savers." Don't always use one....but mostly in the central Sierra I do...

Critter stories: (Off-topic, I know, but I couldn't resist) One evening in the 60s at Ediza Lake we'd made some Richfood no-bake brownies. They were God-awful -- utterly inedible even given the (ahem) apetite-altering materials we usually brought along in those days. Hit the sack without thinking of the pan of chemicals we'd left out, but during the occasional roll-over I thought I could hear tiny gnawing sounds. And in the morning: halleluja! The mess had been taken care of. I'm probably guilty of poisoning some poor forest creature, alas.

Poor critter, you put the "other" poison away I bet, so it had nothing to wash it down with. That is cruelty to animals.

another critter story - at Pear Lake 2 summers ago, we camped up on the rocks north of the lake but spent the day lounging near the lake trying to stay cool in the shade. When we got back to camp later that afternoon, we found that it had been invaded by marmots who had scattered our stuff everywhere. My boots and poles were missing and my backpack (hanging in a tree) chewed. They were fond of the sweaty parts. We finally found the poles yards apart dragged under rocks and also the boots, each one dragged in a differentt direction under large rocks and chewed badly but wearable. I learned on Mt. Whitney to stuff and hang my sleeping bag and leave my tent unzipped but these guys were determined!