Yikes a Bear! A Mount Washburn Hike

Pete Riola — Sat, 15 Jun 2024 21:18:37 +0000

A Family Hike Up Mount Washburn, Yellowstone

It all started as a harmless hike up Mount Washburn.

The four of us, two adults and kids ages seven and ten were camped at Canyon and our hiking trip this day was to start early in the morning at the Mount Washburn Trailhead. This hike was received well by three of us. Upon parking and starting the hike up the mountain the hike was waylaid, like many, by me. I had spotted numerous birds, Clark’s Nutcrackers and grouse to name a couple and the bird photographer in me was interested and thus the trip up was delayed an hour or two. I couldn’t resist. These birds were posing. Eating seeds they went about their business without a real care that a dude was lying on the ground with a 500mm lens in hand. Luckily my family was good with this and they entertained themselves with the view and some meandering about until I had satisfied the photography urge.

Moving now toward the real hike, up Mount Washburn, I went thru the rules. The bear rules being the most important. It was late August and bears are attracted to Mount Washburn by the lure of white bark pine trees and their seeds. You see bears, both black and grizzly favor eating these seeds on Mount Washburn in August into September. So the main thing is if you see a black bear, freeze, don’t give up ground. If we see a grizzly, make ourselves big, gather together and slowly back away. Ok the rules are set.

Beginning up the trail to the top is a fairly easy hike and we were looking forward to seeing and experiencing this mountain for the first time. As we started to ascend the mountain we could not have been 300 yards up the trail when a black bear popped out right in front of us just on the edge of the trail. Now having explained the basic black bear rule 3 of the 4 us froze ready to watch this bear go about his or her business from a reasonably safe distance. There were no cubs and I was comfortable viewing the bear at 50 yards or so. To me this bear has seen people, probably mulitple times and it was just on it’s way somewhere. But now, in a split two seconds my daughter of 7 starts to bolt back down the trail! The chase was on to grab her and stop this madness of which I did. But now the bear had been spooked and it trotted across the trail and ran down the mountainside with me pointing may camera and pushing the shutter button while simultaineaously holding my kid. The running shots were trash but I did get a couple at the begining of this experience that shows what we saw initially. Probably needless to say, but the hike was suspended at this point and we went to Dunraven Pass which is just a hop skip and jump down the road to see if the bear was headed there. No bear at Dunraven but all was now calm and we had an experience to be remembered for life. It ended up harmless too.

Mount Washburn Sightings

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Mount Washburn Black Bear

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Clark’s Nutcracker

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Dusky Grouse

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Sage Grouse Eating

← A Grizzly Attack

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A Grizzly Attack

Pete Riola — Tue, 07 May 2024 15:32:59 +0000

A Grizzly Attack

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Now you’re asking yourself why did I post this story? Well the motorist who picked up Greg was me.

Me and my permanent girlfriend Anne were vacationing in Grand Teton National Park late summer of 1997. We’d already visited and hiked many of the parks main attractions so on this day we made the decision to travel down a dirt road named Ashton-Flagg Ranch Road. This decision was easy. We were camped at the nearby Headwaters Camp Ground and we were searching for some adventure away from the crowd. Our goal was to find a spot to hike and possibly see a moose, some elk, deer any wildlife off the beaten path. This road was kind of iffy with numerous potholes and bumps.

Now the Associated Press is what it is and they made a brief report of the encounter and I’m writing to tell what I recall is as Paul Harvey would say “the rest of the story.”

Driving ever so slowly toward the Snake River, I’d say we were a couple of miles down this road, when a man in camo, with a bow on his back trampled out onto the dirt road about 100 yards in front of us. It was obvious something had happened, he was dragging a leg and one of his arms was wrapped in his T shirt. Holy buckets! We drove up to meet this man and I quickly jumped out to check on this guy. He was in obvious disarray and he was injured. I told him to jump in the backseat of our Jimmy and I’d take him to get help. Along the way and as I recall it he told us he had been dragged out of a tree by a momma grizzly bear. He had been bow hunting for moose along a spot he had scouted on the Snake River. Greg was his name and he told us he had been trying to get a tag for this hunt for 5 years. It was a lifetime hunt he had been dreaming of. Only the dream was interrupted. I can only hope in the years since he had a chance to complete the dream.

Greg was stressed and injured. He told us he was from Texas and he had a young family. I remember Greg saying he saw the bear coming down the river bed on the opposite side he was hunting with two cubs in tow. The bears were a couple hundred yards from Greg. The mother bear had spotted him. In an instant she began to run towards him. He began to look for a way out and up a tree he went. But the bear was fast, way faster than a bear was thought to be and she grabbed him by the foot and dragged him to the ground. The bear paused as Greg played dead. She paused for an eary minute or so then she grabbed him by the hand and gave him a shake. Somehow he remained “dead.” She sat a few feet away from him for quite a bit as I remember him saying. Now after a lengthy encounter she was satisfied he was not a danger and she began to retreat from the scene.

Laying dead on the ground for a while he decided it was time to go for help. He started his way towards the road and that’s where we encountered this injured moose hunter. As I remember the encounter we dropped him off at the Ranger Station which I’m saying was 20 minutes back and the Rangers took it from there.

Back at camp a mere couple of miles from the event of the day. We chatted, ate and went to bed. A few days later we read the story in The Cody Wyoming newspaper. Whew!