Lions, no. Tigers, no. Bears? OH MY

                The second week in I had heard a rumor about a bison carcass out in Lamar that had some activity. I found my BFF, Kelli, and we hit the road to Lamar. We were a mile from Floating Island Ponds and there was a traffic jam…At the time, it was rather unusual for a jam to be since there was nothing in sight. Our luck just started. We pulled into a parking spot on the pull off and there was a black bear and two cubs 150 yards away. There was an interpreter there talking about the bears’ habitat and eating habits. This area, to us, was a new bear area for the next couple of weeks. Bears tend to stay in an area close to their place of hibernation for a couple weeks to a month after they wake up and then go to new eating grounds for roughly the same time before repeating themselves.

                After we snapped some photos of the far away shots we could, we hit the road to find ourselves in another bear jam at Floating Island Pond. This time it was a grizzly and there were no cars behind us meaning we could stop in the middle of the road. The grizzly was heading south away from the black bears and was about 500 feet away across the pond on a hill. We snapped two or three photos and continued the drive. At this point we were talking about seeing every animal in Yellowstone because four bears in day are hard to see unless you’re lucky. We were passing Elk Creek where I always tell the story of my brother visiting and we saw our first moose in the vegetation there. After we passed the Petrified Tree there were cars pulled over at a pull out where they were snappy photos and looking with binoculars. We pulled up and looked out in the distance and on top of a hill was a moose. We ran back to the car and grabbed our cameras and started taking photos. The moose was taking his time eating some food so we thought we would stick around. After ten minutes or so we hopped back in the car.

As we pulled out a car pulled in and we shared information. We told them about the moose and they told us about a bear near Roosevelt. We drove 500 feet and got out of the car and watched from the hill above. There were three bison spread out over the open field as a black bear ran across the field. It looked like he got within 15 feet of a bison. While the bear passed, the bison looked up and kept his eyes on the bear. We were both hoping for a fight of some sort and have a chance to see the circle of life be born but that’s where are luck ran out.

After the 5^th bear we got in the car and discussed how our luck was. We both said it was out and we headed back to Mammoth. On the way back we managed to see a moose, a grizzly and one black bear without its cubs; who would have thought? When we got to the EDR people didn’t ask us what we did today because before they could ask, we were saying, “What did I do today? OH, I saw 5 bears and a moose! What have you done with yourself today?” Some people congratulated us, others, mainly the people who were working, glared at us.