Joe Dawson: Backpacking: High Sierra Trail September 2008

The Story

I hiked 25 years in the Sierras without seeing a bear. Then, on this trip, I saw two in the first two days. This one stalked me. Scroll down for the story. Note that the color of the bear's coat is not an artifact of light reflection. This bear is, in fact, blond. That's right: blond body, dark legs, head and tail. I had never heard of such a color, but here it is.

I was hiking the High Sierra Trail from west, at Lodgepole, to east, at Whitney Portal. I drove my camper van to Whitney Portal on Monday, Sept 1, and spent the night there in the van at the trailhead parking lot. The next morning, my ride arrived: a private shuttle that would take me back around to my entry trailhead at Lodgepole, a 320 mile drive. Norm Wilder arrived, as promised, at 8:00 am sharp. I threw my gear in the back of his pickup and we drove off immediately. This would prove to be a problem. By not allowing extra time for packing and weighing and making trade offs and leaving behind all gear that was not absolutely essential, I went in carrying too much. My pack weighed, including 5 pints of water, 65 lbs at the outset.

Because of having to drive around the southern end of the mountains, I got a late start on Tuesday: I finally set off from the Crescent Meadow trailhead at 3:30 pm. I was intending to hike to the Mehrten Creek campsite, 4.7 miles in, on the first day. Because of my heavy pack, however, I traveled much slower than planned without fully realizing it until much later. Thus, upon arriving at a creek after about three hours of travel, one that had two flat spots big enough to pitch a tent, I thought I'd arrived at Mehrten Creek. It turned out that I was at a place called Panther Creek, a good two miles short of my intended destination that day.

I dropped my pack and, as I frequently do before opening it up and setting up camp, decided to explore the next 200-400 yards of trail on the off chance of finding a better site. Not finding one, I had turned around and was heading back when I saw the bear on the trail in front of me, between me and my pack.

Now the trail from Crescent Meadow follows a gigantic canyon whose sides slope about 45 degrees and are thick with trees, underbrush, rocks which may shift if you step on them and a thick layer of slippery duff. In other words, the off-trail terrain is not really usable by humans. I was stuck on the footpath. The bear, on the other hand, could use the path or move freely up and down the mountainside, as he saw fit.

I took a picture of him from where I stood. Then I cleared my throat, as if to say "This is MY trail." Obligingly, the bear left the trail and moved some 50 feet uphill, to a group of rocks. As it moved away, I could see that it was a male.

"That was easy," I thought, and continued walking in the direction of my pack. When I drew even with the bear, I took some more pictures. As I moved down the trail, the bear at first stayed abreast of me, 50 feet uphill. Then he began slanting downwards. After a few moments, he intersected the path behind me and began following. At this point, I realized that continued walking would constitute a retreat, something to be avoided at all costs. I stopped and turned to face him. When I did that, he left the trail again, this time on the downhill side. But he took an oblique direction which, while not coming at me directly, continued to narrow the distance between us. Some years before, I had heard this movement pattern characterized as stalking.

When he was 10 feet away, I thought "If I'm going, I want it documented," and snapped the picture you see above. The light was fading at this time, and the flash went off. He blinked. Then he moved off downhill.

Relieved, I returned to my pack and began setting up camp. At some point I looked up and there, on the other side of the stream, not more than 20 feet away, stood the bear. He was watching me. Now that I was back with my gear, I had my trekking poles. I banged them together, blew my whistle - the one I've been carrying 25 years for just this occasion - and screamed at him. He moved uphill, crossed the stream (pausing for a drink as he did so), continued to circle me at a respectable distance until he got back down to the trail about 50 feet away from me and then kept on going.

It was nearly dark. I finished pitching the tent, furnished it with my clothes, air mattress and sleeping bag, and got inside. Believe it or not, I actually fell asleep in fairly short order.

The next morning, Wednesday, the British Army came marching through my campsite. At least, a British Army medical team, numbering about 30 men and one woman and divided into three groups, passed through. They were on a training exercise for a mountain mission elsewhere later in the year. They too were following the High Sierra Trail, though they would complete it in one week to my two. A thoroughly sociable group, they made friends up and down the trail the whole trip. We traded stories. I told them about the bear.

The day after that, on Thursday afternoon and about 10 miles further down the trail, I met Ranger Nina Weisman coming the other way. We had never met before, but she had heard all about me. "Ah, there you are!" she greeted me. "Tell me about your bear encounter." Evidently the British had been repeating my story and now I was famous. Nina listened while I recapitulated the events of Tuesday. Then she gave me an education.

Only dominant bears, she told me, use the trails. The trails make getting around easier for the bears just as they do for people. But a trail will support only a limited amount of foraging. So the dominant bears will stake out whatever length of trail will support their needs and then keep all other bears off of it. The bear I encountered was a young one, perhaps 18 months old. He was 2 to 2 1/2 feet at the shoulder, weighed perhaps 150 lbs, and would be slightly taller than me if he stood up. An adolescent. My problem, Nina told me, was that I was entirely too passive from the beginning. Instead of yelling and throwing sticks and stones at him, I was taking pictures. To the bear, I appeared to be weak. He saw an opportunity. He was going to throw my butt right off that trail. It seems that adolescent punks are the same, whether they're ursine or human.

Below: my first sight of the bear on the trail, heading my way:

Below: the bear as it began descending from the rocks:

I saw the second bear on Wednesday. I had just crossed Mehrten Creek when I turned around and saw him on the other side of the stream. I took its picture. (Hadn't met Nina yet.) This bear was larger, black and had what appeared to be a canvas collar around its neck and a tag in its right ear, number 58. It seemed completely indifferent to me. It turned upstream and headed toward the campsites, like it was doing its regular rounds and was hoping to get lucky and find some garbage. When it moved on, so did I.