Personal Photoshoot with a Black Bear

Thursday evening after getting set up at Wabasso campground in Jasper National Park we drove a few kilometers down the road to visit Athabasca Waterfall.  The Athabasca River is interesting as it flows north and empties into the Bering Sea.  This waterfall had many different spots you could view the falls and the river.  It even let you walk down into the narrow canyon where the falls used to go and then view the river at the bottom where it calmly flowed on down.

This one also had a platform right at the top of where it hurtled down giving you the sensation of being right in the waterfall. At the one end you can get the spray all over you from the water.

There was a bench there with an inscription IN MEMORY of some 21 year old guy who died in 2006 when he made a “bad judgment call” and fell over the falls to his death.  I think that is why there are fences all around.

Dad also took this great picture of a Columbia Lily. Beautiful & very unique color



 As we were driving back to camp on the road where you are supposed to be able to see more wildlife - lo and behold we saw a black bear small to medium sized (Dad figures 3 yr old) just grazing along the side of road.  He crossed the road and moved down toward a little pond so we thought we had lost him but them he showed up along the side hill on the right hand side of road.  We ended up with over an hour long personal photo shoot with a bear.  Only two other cars went by & didn’t even stop & NO RANGERS!  I even started using the second camera out the window of the truck it was so amazing. My first published picture!

He came even closer down into the ditch to drink some water running there at one point. You could hear him breathing he was so close. I closed the door of the truck. We just kept moving the truck along to keep next to him. 

He was only 10 to 12 feet away from me when that picture was taken and totally unconcerned with us watching him.

He walked along the side of bank and used his two front legs to turn over rocks and then stuck his nose in the hole to see if he liked the bugs there.  If he did he would slurp them all up with his tongue.  If not he would just walk on to the next rock and turn it over to check.  He would also munch on dandelions or other flowers or grass he decided he liked. 

Finally Dad stood up in the back of the truck when the bear moved higher up on the bank and I drove.  Dad would say OK move and then pound on the top of cab to stop when the bear was in an open spot again because I could not see the bear from inside the cab.  What a deal his own personal moving photo platform!  We finally had to stop shooting when the bear ambled back across the road and moved deeper into the brush and trees.  We were losing the light by then anyway at around 10 pm.  When we got back to the trailer and down loaded between the two of us we had taken almost 300 shots. AMAZING!!