We Spy Something BIG

The ghost town adventure might not have lived up to its hype, but hold on to your chew toys boys and girls because the next thing we saw sure did!  Let's just say - we think we found the dude or dudette that lives behind this gate -

Wait for it . . . wait for it . . .

That, our friends, is what you call a grizzly bear butt!  In the FUR!  We were driving through Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest on the way back to the campground.  We were sort of disappointed that we hadn't seen any bear yet.  After all, we had driven all the way around Yellowstone TWICE.  There were rumors of bear spotting, but none for us.  So, seeing this bear was extra exciting 'cause we weren't expecting it.  It was on a long, winding road.  Dad was driving, Mom was looking out the window, we were sleeping.

All of a sudden, Mom says "There's a bear, there's a bear!" 

Dad says, "Where?" 

She says, "There!" 

Dad says, "Where?" 

She says, "Right there!" 

Well, you get how the conversation went. 

She says, "It's right there, running through those woods!  Keep going!  Keep going!  The road curves back around!  Maybe we'll catch him coming through the other side."  (She didn't really mean "catch" him, you know, just "see" him.) 

Mom's getting out the camera and telling Dad to step on it.  But, Dad didn't see the bear, so he's not really getting what she's talking about, so he's poking along. 

And Mom's saying/yelling, "Keep going!  Keep going!" 

So, we finally rounded the bend and sure enough, there's this big old bear hauling butt out of the woods and across the road right in front of us and then into the woods on the other side.  All Mom gets is a picture of his butt, but that was enough to prove we saw him. 

Anyway, here's the bizarre part.  Dad stops the car in the middle of the road - grabs the camera from Mom - jumps out of the car - and runs after the bear.  If you had any question about Dad's, um, sanity, well that should tell you all you need to know!  We will say that there were no other cars and we hadn't seen any others the whole time we were in the forest, but STILL - he was chasing a bear with a camera! . . . 

That bear had hauled butt pretty quickly and was nowhere to be seen.  Dad finally got back in the car and we drove on looking for another sighting of the bear, but he was obviously smarter than us!  We even went back the next day looking for ole grizzly butt, but that dude/dudette was hiding from us!  Probably scared of Dad! hehe

The Road Dogs (stalking grizzly bear)