Holidays and absences

Glad you liked em. Here's some more with mountains and beasts.

There's a large National Park in the middle so there are lots of animals. They somehow know exactly where the safe boundaries are and when hunting season starts.

edit: the first picture is apparently too wide, but to me it's the Misty Mountains. Here's the address:
http://www.nps.gov/olym/naturescience/images/BaileyRangeFromHurricaneRidge_BB.JPG

gorgeous, that is the misty mountains!

goodbye everyone! I'm off, see you in a week!!

Have a good trip Norc and I hope the Trolls dont nick your tent

Dave those bears are so cute.. from a safe distance

CUTE:





NOT CUTE:

Happy trails Norc. The forum wont be the same without you, a lot quieter and less Sherlocky, but not the same. Have fun and come back safely to us.

omg Dave that little bear is adorable.

I hope you enjoy your trip, Norc!

I remember seeing a bear when I was in Alaska. Our ship stopped at a fish cannery and we were on a walking tour and the guide was talking about how sometimes you'll see bears and what to do if you do see one, and then I was like "hey, there's a bear right in front of us". It was a baby, though it was bigger than the one in Dave's picture. I think it was maybe a year or two old. We all stopped and stared at it for a moment and it stared back before turning around and walking off into the woods, presumably to find its mother. It was awfully cute from a distance.

Those pictures are awesome, David Both the scenery and the animals.

Norc: God tur

I've lived with bears all around me for most of my life, so I've got a lot of bear stories, but let me share one of my sister's.

When my sister was about 13 our family went on an overnight hike up the Quinault River, one river south of the Hoh where most of the above pictures are from. It was her time of the month, which is always an attraction to bears. It's also worth mentioning that she wasn't in the best of moods.

On the morning of the second day she had slipped off into the bushes to deal with things. She had her trousers around her ankles when she heard a rustling behind her.

Naturally assuming it was one of her beastly brothers invading her privacy, she spoke to us in the way that only a 13 year old girl in such circumstances can speak.


But turning her head around to confront us with the full wrath of her righteous fury, she found herself facing a curious black bear with his nose twitching:
. The bear found himself facing this:

We could hear the commotion clear back at camp. We were much more amused than our sister was!

Our sister was much more civil to us for the rest of the hike, especially because we agreed to stand guard for her as needed.

Eldorion wrote:

I remember seeing a bear when I was in Alaska. Our ship stopped at a fish cannery and we were on a walking tour and the guide was talking about how sometimes you'll see bears and what to do if you do see one, and then I was like "hey, there's a bear right in front of us".

Eldo, do you happen to remember which town or island this was on? I used to know Southeast AK pretty well, and I can tell if it was a black bear cub or a brown bear cub (aka grizzly bear cub).

Just to confuse things, black bears are often brown in color.
Brown bears are never black that I know of, though they can often be grey.
Seriously, I'm not just making this up to annoy Elthir!

I don't remember for sure, but doing a bit of poking around online to refresh my memory I'm pretty sure it was Ketchikan. My grandmother and I went on a small ship cruise and visited a bunch of small towns up and down the panhandle and unfortunately I haven't kept all of them straight in my head. It's possible it was Wrangell. I know the bear encounter was when we were near a canning facility, though that seemed remote, so it might not have been in any specific town proper.

thats a great story Dave, I have never lived in a country with huge animals roaming about, it seems scary to me, I dont think I would go camping with hungry bears about in England the worst thing that could happen is an irritated squirrel throwing nuts at your head, here in Italy there are wolves and wild boar and bears too but they are very rare and live deep in the mountains. The snakes and scorpions are horrible though, the scorpions like to hide in laundry baskets I have had a few close encounters in the undie department.

The biggest predator in Scotshobbitland is Big Boab the Pie-eater, just down the road. Bit short of huge and dangerous animals of the non-human type here.
We've even only got 1 poisnous snake and it doesn't like being anywhere near people. About the only way to get bitten by one is to carelessly stand on it whilst calling its mother names.

We'll be leaving tomorrow. Will be seeing you when I have time and if there's internet where we are at the time.

Priceless story We've got bears in Norway too, though only brown bears, and the population is near exctinct. Never seen one, but seen the tracks of one a couple of times

Have a nice trip, Amarië!

Everyone bar me is buggering off on hols I just want you all to know I am extremely crabbit about that!

{{{{Have a great time Amarie-watch for trolls, giant herring (Ringdrotten and his army buddies have yet to catch it you know) and Norcs in the wild!}}}

Not quite yet, another four weeks till my hols start!

(Although I am going to start them right, a friends wedding and then a week at the olympics! )

Hope all those going have a good time! I love camping, tent of course - I will have to waterproof ours before we go again though.....it got a little damp last time!

Pettytyrant101 wrote:Everyone bar me is buggering off on hols I just want you all to know I am extremely crabbit about that!

{{{{Have a great time Amarie-watch for trolls, giant herring (Ringdrotten and his army buddies have yet to catch it you know) and Norcs in the wild!}}}

Drink yourself stupid and put on some sunglasses. Should do the trick.

{{{{Thanks! And don't worry, we are well prepared. The Norcs roam in the North where they can battle the reindeer for the best grass. We have Anit-Troll detection units installed and we plan to drive mostly on land since the submarine version of the caravan was a bit too pricey. Oh, our brave Jævla Stor Sild hunters! Excuse me while I swooooooooon a bit. Where would we be without them? }}}}

Drink yourself stupid and put on some sunglasses. Should do the trick.- Amaie

But except the sunglasses I do that anyway! And I'm in Scotshobbitland- putting on sunglases just makes everywhere too dark to see.

Well if you're not seeing stars and pink dancing elephants, then you're not doing a good enough job! And since the world will be spinning like crazy, not seeing (any thing real) will be a pluss.

"My God....its full of stars!" (And pink elephants )
I go out of my way I'll have you know Amarie to never see anything real at all.

Eldorion wrote:I'm pretty sure it was Ketchikan. ..... It's possible it was Wrangell.

Then it was almost certainly a black bear. You find the brown bears on the northern and western islands and mainland, places like Sitka and Skagway.

The 'blackies" are more like a Labrador or Newfoundland dog in temperament, while the "browns" are more like a Pit Bull, fiercely territorial, especially at certain seasons, with an explosive temper.

When I worked in a cannery in Petersburg, just north of Wrangell, I once was helping a friend take garbage to the dump. There were 5 or 6 resident dump bears (blackies) who lived off the towns garbage and had no fear of people. While I was dragging the bags of garbage out of the back of the pickup, the head bear came over to inspect.

She slashed each bag wide open with one swipe of her huge claws and inspected the contents professionally.

There was a canopy inclosing the back of the pickup, so I had to climb inside to get the last 6 bags.

Unfortunately the bear didn't think I was throwing then out fast enough and decided to come inside with me to help. I had to press against her to get out, kicking the last bag out as I jumped!

There was nothing mean about her, but I saw how she inspected the garbage bags and I didn't want her trying to look in my pockets!

Mrs Figg wrote:thats a great story Dave, I have never lived in a country with huge animals roaming about, it seems scary to me, I dont think I would go camping with hungry bears about

The black bears we have here are really not aggressive unless you try something stupid like getting close to the cubs. The big problem is them stealing food. Never keep food or dirty containers in your sleeping bag or tent, or bad things can happen, just like with mice and squirrels. So just think about bears as large squirrels, and you'll be fine. (Very, very VERY large squirrels!)

When I'm traveling I'm really much more concerned about people's dogs. I'll bet there are a thousand dog attacks for every bear attack! (Brown bears are a different story though...)

The big problem is them stealing food. - David

So Yogi Bear is actually about right then?! Better watch out for those "pic-a-nic" hampers!

Ringdrotten wrote: We've got bears in Norway too, though only brown bears, and the population is near exctinct. Never seen one, but seen the tracks of one a couple of times

I think your brown bears are close cousins of ours. Is there an effort to rebuild their population in Norway? They're really wonderful animals and not bad neighbors if there is a reasonable management program to keep them form getting too "friendly" with people.