Bug

Oh yeah. One more story. Debbie and I were a few miles up the upper Yos canyon laying on top of a rock that was about four feet high. I was on my side facing her and she was on hers facing me. All of a sudden her eyes grew huge and she pointed behind me. I turned around and was face to face with a nice big black bear. I yelled at him and he backed off a little then started walking around the rock and toward my pack. I jumped down between him and the pack and immediately felt real stupid. But he backed off. Then he went up to my tent and stuck his head in to see what he could find. There was nothing in it so he wandered off into the woods. We moved to a campsite that had a cable to hang food on but the cable was pulled down from one side. I had to climb up on rotten stobs to get to the pulley and string the cable through. We hung our food and watched yogi and BooBoo try to get it all night long.

Bug, if a bear really wants to get you, it will. Pepper spary has been shown to bea deterent and in other cases, just does not work. In my situation, we were in Yellowstone in a BC camp along Shoshone Lake. We had sea kayaked up from Lewis Lake, through the Lweis-Shoshone channel and paddled to our campsite. I had been fishing for Mackinaw all day and we cooked some up. All our gear was hung in a bear bag and we were getting ready to hang another with our clothes that we had cooked the fish in in another bear bag. That is one the young male bear came into the camp. It was me and my girlfriend. He walked around the perimeter of our camp for about 10 minutes. We were down by the lake's edge. He came to wear we had cooked, about 50 yds. from our tent. We were going to get in our sea kayaks and paddle out. As he got closer, maybe 15 yds., I sprayed him with pepper spray. He didn't do anything at first, but the wind, which was at our backs took it right into his face. He snorted and pawed at his face, then took off rather quickly. If you really want to know how to deal with bears in the backcountry, go to this link and click on the TV to download make sure your volume is on so you can hear the commentary. I am sure some of you have seen this one before! Funny Aussies! Good story! I like the video too. My teenager was rolling on the floor. I think he's going to try it. I told him to take pepper spray.

I don't mean to put you down but I do pity you your attitude. There are guys who spend their lives studying griz in the park and wouldn't go near em without a 45. I lived in MT for 30 years. Between FS, guiding, recreation, miscelaneous forest work, and, oh yeah bear studies under Charles Jonkel and co I will still carry my gun in the face of being called a pansie. Your three summer stays must have been good summer camp experiences. How did pepper spray work for you if you have never been charged? I have been charged. You realize just how good that jail sentence sounds compared to what is barreling toward you. Killing a bear with a 45 is not all that hard. Here's the drill; you play dead like you don't have a gun. If he leaves, you wash your pants. If he acts like he is going to bury you or snack immediately, you blast into the chest as many times as you can. It has worked for two guys I have met. They have scars yes but I didn't have to dig em up to see them. Tell all the ranger rick stories you want. Outside the park, unless you leave food out in the woods, a bear is going to run from you every time. I have seen mommas run with their cubs bawling WAY behind them. Inside the park, they like to linger. "Saaayyyyy, what is that smell? Did he have scrambled eggs for breakfast? Sex last night? Boy it seems like I run into one of these two-leggeds every time I turn around. Where do they all come from?" You will make one spicy meatball. I had the good fortune of meeting a momma bear with a two or three year old and a yearling. She was pretty mean to the older one cause there just wasn't much food around late in that drought year (88?). He probably weighed about 300lbs and she batted him around like a football. She had found the mess tent for the camp of a FS idiot working as foreman of a bridge crew. Nine of us got her to leave for awhile after a few false charges. The cubs split pretty fast. Two of us hung the food we had just brought up and turned around to see the momma's head emerging from the front of the wall tent 50 yrds away. We held still for a minute as she checked out the scents. When she started toward us we yelled. She broke into a full 800 lb run right at us. We dropped into a gully and sprinted down to the other seven guys and we all yelled like banshies as we backed away. At that point in the year, the berries had been gone for two months. The creeks were trickles. Rotten logs turned to dust. There was nothing for them to eat. They were desperate or we never would have seen them. Many bears ventured into the ranches to find food. Some returned to the woods. The park bears ate garbage.

The south border to Glacier Park is a highway. The griz cross it at will. A grizz encounter/attack in Glacier is not all that uncommon. They are practically unheard of south of the highway (this area includes the Great Bear, Bob Marshall, scapegoat and Misson Mountain wilderness areas). Collared bears have gone back and forth across the highway as seasonal foods require. So it is well documented that the same bears that attack people, or allow people to get close in the park, have no such carelessness outside the park. The only difference to the bears is which side of the border people carry guns. They are not so dumb. If we, or someone, hunted them the way they are hunted outside the park, I think we would have a lot fewer encounters. I stopped playing in the park after I met a couple going into Harris lake as I was leaving. He was killed. She was ripped up pretty good. I missed that bear by pure luck. If I went back into the park, I would carry a big friggin gun and I would not hesitate to use it. Backpacking in Glacier is like walking thru the central district with a kilo of coke over your shoulder.

After spending a lovely night on top of HD with my girlfriend, we moved camp down into the upper valley where all the campsites were full. We mosied on downstream, across the creek and up the hill a ways where we tied our food up in a tree ( I know all the tricks. unfortunately, I did not bring any cable). As night neared the bear gathered. We would see one here then one there and pretty soon, after dark, a random sweep with the flashlight revealed six bears within rock throwing distance. When I heard them climbing my tree, I flashed a lite over at them and there were three bears in the tree with one just getting out to the end of the branch that really should have broken. As he fell, he caught the bag and carried it to the ground. Everybody gathered round as he flung it back and forth distributing the wealth. Debbie was freaked having never camped out before. She didn't sleep much. Yogi didn't get any.

Ja. I gwoped hur. But she was not very gud looking so who caes?

OK. I went out to that site and it was pretty cool. But my wife caught me checking this one out. I don't think she's going to let me back on the internet for awhile.

I went looking for new places to climb this weekend. Started at the Trout Lake TH and went up past Copper lake, Heart, traversed the ridge along Big Heart and came down on Chetwood where I bivied. There wasn't anything that really grabbed me. But, the next day I went up and over Iron Cup and down into the top of the Necklace Valley. There is some nice granite up there boys and girls. It is a long way up there but it is high Quality. I thought I uploaded a pic but it isn't showing up. Anyway, the easiest way up would be to go up the Necklace Valley. That is an 8 mile slog with a lot of elevation gain in the last four miles. The granite is way up in the top too. Great meadows to camp in right below the base. Lots of three and four pitch stuff with a few five pitch routes. Lots of cracks. Bring a brush.

OO. OO. I just did a loop that compares to that. I went in past Trout lake and Copper lake, past Heart and Big Heart, and up to Chetwood where I bivied. Today, I went up and over Iron Cup and over to the head of teh Necklace Valley and down the necklace valley. It was a great cruise. The scenery is almost as good as the Enchantments. Took ice ax, crampons and climbing shoes just to weigh me down but did not use any of it..

Ten years ago, a partner and I were on the Full N rdge of Stuart down low by the snow when a VW Van sized block came down the ice cliff glacier. The ground was shaking, we were screamin and so was the party above us. It left some huge divets.

When I was fighting fires in the late eighties, I was given a helicopter and pilot to survey the area. The pilot asked me if I was all business or wanted to have a little fun. Fun sounded good. We cruised the valleys right up to the headwalls close enough to catch the updrafts which were like elivators. Going close to peaks or ridges was to catch the air currents to get specific results I do not claim to understand. But the pilot did understand what he was doing and used those currents with precision. I'm not saying it's OK to buzz peaks. Just explaining what I experienced.

Griz don't usually eat humans. Black bears are garbage skows and will eat anything. It's always interesting to hear other peoples bear stories. The Blackfeet told me "Bears are our brothers". They have personalities not unlike humans. Some are like me, some are like Trask, very few are like Fairweather. Charles Jonkel was a Bear specialist from the U of Mont. I went to HS with his son and we talked about bears alot. People are so afraid of them but they are around people all the time without being noticed. Huge Griz roam hundreds of miles out into the prairies in creek and river bottoms when the food gets scarce in the woods. Their tracks can be found by schools, picnic areas and you name it. Yet they never bother humans. Unless we bother them. There are a few who go looking for fights but they don't last long. The ranchers take em out quick and quiet. Can't have a bad griz roamin around on yur ranch. Most of them are just like homeless teenagers. They're scrongin for whatever and trying not to get confronted by the man.

A woman needs a reason. A man just needs a place. Those were the good old days because all you had to do was tell her what she pretended she wanted to hear and you got what you wanted. In those days, every girl could still hear the echos of Mom and Dad talking about what a slut was. We were all sluts by that definition.

Went to the mountains. Climbed a bunch. I am a hard man. THUMP THUMP THUMP. The check is in the mail.

Got all packed up with the boat & kids to go to Banks Lake for a 3 day. Made it to North Bend when we turned around rather than fight all weekend. Now I am planning on a 2 day recon into the Necklace valley.

He didn't exactly pull himself up by his own bootstraps. How did he get his first job (wasn't that ceo of a Texas oil company?)? I have an uncle who was a Yale alumni. Clinton's pot smokin was nothin compared to W. He was a HARD partier until "He found the Lord". In other words, daddy said "straighten up and I'll give you $38million. Keep partying and you can clear brush on my ranch".

Duh. I'm a dung beetle. That's why I live on cc.com.

I'll take all your cams. Check PMs

I'm sorry but Reagan is no sacred cow. He just happened to have the best propaganda machine since the Third Reich (no other similarities insinuated. honest). I could go on and on about how Reagan used carefully worded generalizations that were meant to be taken in many different ways by vastly differring people. They used the cowboy persona to perfection. The first president to be seen in leather since Teddy was Ronnie - the first time we saw him after we invaded Granada. After his Polyp operation- back in the saddle-literally. and on and on. Look carefully at his record. He did some good things (like most presidents) but he severely eroded our miranda rights (not to mention deficits, higher taxes, user fees, bigger government, etc). He will not go down in history as being great. That is a star-struck opinion of those who bought into the Media presentation. Turn off your TV!

Put your beer down. I am totally against the patriot act and do totally believe that Bush and his cronies are a bunch of fascists. Just don't try to tell me any modern president wasn't just as self serving and crooked. We are being brainwashed by mass media. Somebody like Walter Cronkite would be labeled "Lunatic fringe" right now. The mass media "new" is entertainment. It is not journalism. It is through brilliant manipulation of the mass media that we are being bilked out of our constitutional rights. A cop does not need a reason to stop you and search your car. People are being prosecuted for crimes using evidence obtained under the patriot act even though they have nothing to do with terrorism. If you call your buddy AlpineK and plot a crime together, say buying a pound of good bud. Under the patriot act, your phone can be tapped and you can go to jail based solely on your own phone conversation. That is the errosion I am talking about. If you think electing someone "with a good heart" to the Whitehouse is going to fix things, fine. Explain how that person is going to get any party's nomination.

One of my brothers is an opthamological sturgon. He doe cataract surgeries at 4 to 6K a pop. on a "good day" he can do nine. Overhead on three nurses, building, malprcatice insurance, equipment, liscenses, supplies takes about 55%. He gets the rest. Do the math. Then the patients need drugs. so forth and so on. Socialized medicine does not work well in America any more than capitalism works in Russia. The cultures are not willing to look past the temporary bumps to the goal. Meanwhile we have socialized our society with military protection, police, power, sewrer, roadways, retirement, being poor, being a lumber company, being an oil company,.....but don't call us socialists.

I would try to make it. 50/50 right now. Work must be done.

I'm sorry but now I have to lecture the liberals. If I've said it once, I 've said it a thousand times, Anyone who has made it to the White House doesn't have a moral bone in their egomaniacial body. ITS ABOUT ME STUPID!!! That's all there is to it. Sure they jump thru the hoops for one special interest or another but it's for sound bites. Anyone who wants the job should be automatically disqualified. That would have left us with only our first three presidents. After that, it was the constitution that held us together. Now we are letting that slip through slight of hand in the mass media. Hang on to your hats boys. They want blow jobs from all of us. The only way to stop them is with knowledge.

there is a lot more info there than can be cut into a single paragraph. putting a spin on events takes a sentence, straightening out the spin put on by a number of posters takes a short article. if it's too long for you, skip over it. Who appointed you chief cook and bottle washer? Must you always feel the need to "un-spin" our comments? What makes you possibly think we agree with you? I do skip over most of your shit because it's extremely boring and one-sided. I would suggest that you buy some friends and pretend you have a life, and spend less time playing "cub reporter". Again, thank you for your patience. Yeah. When Trask says "dems are dumb" you're supposed to say "No they're not". Haven't you read the rules?

The kids ropeup came and went. Mostly a "went" kind of thing. I would bring my kids to the ropeup but would be prepared to answer some tough questions from her kindergarten teacher the following week. Maybe the kids could be there just long enough to win a raffle?