Rubicon 2011

Blaine pretty much filled you all in on everything we did! These pictures never do justice to what we were driving over. Needless to say, despite the bear and my fall on the rock, and the huge bruise I got we also had a good time! It was a long bumpy ride but well worth it. So, about the bear story! Before we even left I was nervous about the bears because we had been reading stories about bears being up where we were headed. I was mostly nervous because I was taking my kiddo with me and if I encountered a bear, not only did I have to defend myself but also my kiddo. So, I made sure Trent brought his gun with us, just in case! Well, we were all exhausted, so Thursday night we all hit the sack pretty early, around 9. In the middle of the night (not sure the time), I wake up to this noise that sounds like the camp next to us trying to get in their coolers. The camp next to us was about 20 yards or so from where mine and Trent's tent was. I kept listening to the noise and thought what are they getting in their coolers for. Well, as I keep listening I am thinking to myself that is no person getting into the coolers, that sounds like something else. The coolers were being trashed around. So, I think I am going to wake up Trent and see if he thinks it something getting into them. Just as as I am about to tap Trent, I hear the guy in the camp unzip his tent and yell really loud, "Hey, get out of here!" Well, that yelling woke Trent up and he flew up! Next think we hear is a gun shot! Trent unzips our tent and yells to the guy where did he go becuase he wants to see it. Well, the guy and Trent carry on a bit of a conversation about guns, etc. for a minute and then it's back to sleep. Although I couldn't sleep because I was popping up to every sound I heard. Finally after about 2 hours of laying there I finally fell back asleep. I woke up around 6:45 and needed to go the bathroom, so I head out of the tent and see our cooler lid had been popped off because we had not hung that in the tree because it only had drinks in it. The bear didn't take anything out of the cooler except for our bag of ice that he drug a little ways. Dad was also getting up at this time and I go over to talk to him about the whole bear experience and come to find out, he slept through the whole thing, even the gun shot! Trent lowered our food down from the tree shortly after and went to put the ratchet straps back in the Jeep and comes back to tell us the bear has been in all our Jeeps, so we had to go check out the paw prints. Later we found out he stole dad's muffins, the tupperware the muffins were in, and the cooler bag the tupperware was in out of his Jeep and that the camp next to us had chased the bear twice out of dad's Jeep. Blaine didn't really know there had been a bear either. He kinda thought it was all his dream when he heard the gun shot and Trent and the guy talking about guns. So, that was the bear story. We didn't get to see the bear but he sure caused chaos at Buck Island that night, I am sure that is an every night thing for that bear. Easy food with all those people camped there!