And there was the bear......I had deliberated on which trail to take my yellow lab, Starbuck yesterday. I wanted to hike to Lost Creek and have a picnic but it was a little off the beaten track. My other option was a road that we call Ski Lodge Road because someone tried to build a ski resort off that road in the 70s. It never made it into a resort. Jon was not at home and so no one would miss us if we did not return. So I chose the more traveled Ski Lodge Road. It should be the safest trek.

I had been taking photos of bear prints up there for about three weeks but was not concerned because the road should not be the typical place to see a bear during that time of day, right? After all I had not seen the bear since seeing the prints. Well, this was my sound reasoning.

So Starbuck and I were on the way back home and had made it down to the curves and the aspen grove. Starbuck had been sniffing the air and acting as if she smelled something different. However she is always alert on that road because of all the deer and elk. But then I saw it and stopped dead in my tracks. Just below us standing up on its hind feet was a black bear right in the open, right in front of an aspen. It was between me and my way home. Suddenly Starbuck spotted it. She began barking like a wild thing. I was clinging to her leash (thankfully on a short lead) to keep her from getting away from me or dragging me toward the bear. Her barking got the bear's attention and it dropped on all fours and ran into the trees. Because it was running away from us I was able to appreciate its beauty. Only one little problem. The bear ran in the trees in the direction we had to go to get to the Bob Marley jeep (my jeep).

Well, since I am writing this you know we made it safely back. However I made the rest of our journey looking to the right and to the left and up because bears can climb trees! In last year's tradition of naming the bears I saw, I named this bear as well. I called it JB (Joy's Bear) because my friend, Joy lives on Ski Lodge Road. It is my hope that JB escapes the hunters who are out en masse! Praise God for watching over us as we walked on the "safer" trail!