The Four - Legged Bullet

This just in from the memory department:

I’m in a four-wheel drive International Scout with two other people on a wildlife excursion into Denali National Park, Alaska. The road is unpaved yet maintained yearly with freshly graded gravel by a gold mine, which shared it with the park.

Since dawn there had been few sightings and we were already arguing about stopping for lunch. We stopped at a turnout near the edge of one the great mountain’s branches. Below lay the flattened expanse of a graveled shallow river, which was basically fed all summer by a melting glacier a few miles above us.

It was an opportune chance to get out, stretch and to squint through our binoculars on a more steady footing. The driver spotted a small dot about three miles below us that appeared to be moving across the plain below. Sure enough, as I focused upon it, an image resolved of a grizzly bear walking in our general direction.

It was impossible to get a perspective as to size and speed. Every reference object was either a random stone in the river’s wash or a small patch of tundra. It seemed like in only a minute or so that the bear’s size had doubled and he had already glided across the ribbons of glacial runoff. He was now poised at the edge of our promontory and disappeared about a quarter of a mile below us.

I suddenly had the urge to get closer to the Scout and used the excuse of gaining a higher vantage on the roof. The Grizzly was only a few hundred yards below us when it had last been seen seconds before, bursting through some brush into a brief clearing. I opened the doors to the Scout and startled everyone with a warning that we might be too close. Checking the wind direction, I had hoped we were downwind from where the Grizzly seemed to be heading.

Suddenly the sound of branches crashing and stones tumbling announced the entrance of our ‘wildlife’ subject. He seemed to be very busy and intent on getting somewhere the entire time we had observed him, yet now, as he emerged onto the roadway, I was stunned to see this monster stand up on his hind legs to a height of at least ten feet. He paused and panned the air with a rather articulated snout, flaring it like a rodeo horse and snorting a few brief puffs of air.

The feeling of hunger in my stomach quickly disappeared, to be replaced by a slight nausea. I was relieved as this beast retracted again and bounded up to a nearby outcropping of scattered rocks and bare dirt. “What was this bear doing?” I puzzled.

The answer soon became apparent. The bear was what I guessed to be at least 1,500 pounds, and slavishly devoted to its nose. He followed it rapidly to a small hole under one of the outcroppings rocks and he stood up on his hind legs with both front paws raised to the sky. Quite like a blacksmith at the forge, he slammed those paws down above the hole and a fat squirrel emerged quickly between his legs in a state of alarm. It was not to be a good day for the squirrel. The articulation and speed of this once misunderstood animal was far faster than I could have imagined. Seconds later the squirrel had been shaken and swallowed, only to be followed in like fashion by five others.

This event happened a mere fifty yards from where we stood. To say that any of us had time to exit the vicinity before this mighty Grizzly could have reached us was myth. No driver in the Indy 500 could have exited from the pits in enough time to escape from being this guy’s lunch.

The wind and our luck were in our favor.

I would live to tell this story again and again to my family and friends.

How wonderful not to be eaten alive!

Milton