Bears and Blueberries

Well that hike we (Becky, I and her friend Julie from work) went on yesterday was fantastic. Just about a half mile up the trail from the parking lot right on the old logging road past the berry picker's cabins we saw a mother bear and her two cubs standing in the roadway giving us the once-over. She was about 50 yards away up the trail. She stood there, looked at us over her shoulder and then high tailed it into the woods with the cubs right on her heels. It was the forst time that I saw a bear in the wild and I was absolutely thrilled. The whole hike was filled with wild-life from the deer that ran across the road in front of my car on the way in to the grouse that we startled coming up on high-point. The other great thing about this hike was a swimming hole about 3/4 of the way through the hike just about 100 yards upstream from the waterfall. The water rushing to the falls created a pool of crystal clear water about 7'deep and 10 yards across. The water is *cold*! Cold enough to leave you breathless, but it was quite refreshing after the humid sweat soaked slog we had already done. The first part of the hike goes up a long unused roadway past a bunch of derilect berry-picker cabins. In fact, the entire 9 mile hike went through enormous patches of blueberry bushes. I would like to return in a few weeks wn=hen the berries ripen; should see a lot more bears then!