The family and some friends went camping from last Friday until July 4th at Wells State Park. I worked from home Friday (and yes I actually worked), and did not arrive until around 7:30pm. Our 3yo son wanted to ride his trike around the campground and seemed to have too much energy for the adults who spent the day setting up camp, so I headed off with him around the five plus mile grand loop. I figured we would go up hill as far as possible, then head back down once he had burned off enough energy. Being a 3yo he had unlimited reserves and we made it all the way up to the top, halfway between the South Trail entrance and the base of Carpenters Rock (map). I was quite tired and we stopped to prepare for the trip down. The trike wheels are quite loud and the sudden quiet sounds of twilight were quite nice. There was a rustling just off to the left off the road as something came through the woods.
My brain went through the usual progression of squirrel, dog, large dog, look for the owner. Then a large black animal about chest high burst through, bounded across the road, crashed through the brush on the other side and stopped. My brain was expecting a dog and was quickly running thought all the animals it had seen, and drawing a blank. Then my son yelled ‘BEAR!’ *click* Yup, that was a bear. A juvenile black bear, and he was now just off the road to our right about 40 feet in front of us. When it happened I could have sworn I could reach out and touched him, but no it was some distance off. There was some more rustling around and I could see the dark form through the trees. I would have gotten a picture of him, but:
- I didn’t have a camera
- Even if I did, my son was with me
- Even if he wasn’t, it’s a black bear who just covered more distance in a few seconds than I could with a jet pack attached to my back.
So we turned around and headed back down into the main campground. My son desperately wanted to go back and see the bear so the going was not as fast as I would have liked. I went to the ranger station and reported the sighting. It was the first sighting this year at least. There is a mother and child with callers being tracked by animal control. From what I understand it is quite rare for them to come to the park, and even more rare to be seen. I had previously only seen bears on tv or at the zoo. There is quite a difference.
The rest of the time camping was a blast, if less eventful. There was lots of baseball, bike riding, and swimming for the kids, and cooking, sitting and cave man tv (fire) for the adults. My son and I went on a hike around the unnamed trail off of Walker Pond road looking for beavers and herons. We got lucky and found two herons fishing and many, many butterflies. I made three tabblo’s (previews below) and added a tabblo badge to the right hand sidebar. I would have done so sooner, but I wanted to hack the default display a litttle. Ned Batchelder’s blog inspired me to try some shutter settings for time lapsed night photography. My wife is the photographer and artist so the good shots are hers.
Part of the wetlands preserve of Wells State Park in Massachusetts is home to a number of herons, beavers, and owls. There is also a family of black bears, a member of which made a surprise appearance recently. … See my Tabblo>
