Silly Elephant - Still in Alaska

Boy oh boy! Talk about a crazy experience. So we take this hike along a glacier in Alaska the other day. We start out early, right after breakfast and are the only ones walking along a trail that takes us through the brush along the side of a very large glacier.

As you can see from the picture below it is a very pretty walk along a very scenic path.
I, of course, am stowed away in the Boss' pack again. He doesn't seem to mind carrying me around even though I am an elephant.

I also think it is because he likes to take pictures of me in very scary poses. Here I am in front of some bear scat the day before on our way up to a copper mine.

It is interesting that he took this picture yesterday because today we came across no less than 12 piles of scat on our walk along the glacier. After seeing a very, very fresh (steaming) deposit I heard the Boss and the Treat Lady say that they were going to head back to camp if they came across another on this hike. I don't know why we didn't turn back when we saw the first dry one.

Before that happened they heard a noise behind them. Luckily it turned out to be two gentlemen hiking up the trail. One was a native of Alaska and the other his brother-in-law. The best part was that they had a very large gun and a can of bear spray. The Treat Lady and the Boss decided that it would be ok to hike along with the two nice gentlemen as they were better prepared for the possibility of meeting a bear. I guess they all really wanted to see this glacier. I wanted to go back!

After a while we were all startled by a snort and then some whining. Here is what we saw.


The Boss just kept taking pictures as the bear could not get down the ridge in front of him. He seemed to be upset and alternated between snorting (very scary) and whining (he sounded like a baby). After a while he just disappeared around the rock. Before he left though the Boss got this picture of that mean bear.

There was no shooting today or bear spraying. I guess we got really lucky. I heard the Boss say he was going to throw me at the bear to distract him if he looked like he was going to charge. I don't think it would have helped much. I didn't like that joke at all.

Our friends from Alaska told us how one fall on a fishing trip they had a bear tear apart their camp. He then came back and they had to shoot him. It seemed only fitting because he had eaten all their food so they had to eat him. They do things a little different here in Alaska.

I was happy that the Boss didn't try to take my picture in front of anything scary that day. It was bad enough just hearing that bear from inside his pack.

Today we got to see much friendlier faces such as this Sea Otter. I hope we go home soon!!

Silly Elephant in Alaska

Silly Elephant:

So here's what happened the other day. The Boss and the Treat Lady were moving around the house packing up their bags. They always do this when one or both of them disappears for a while. This time it looked like both of them were going. The dogs were acting really strange. Rooney was following them around every where they went. Cassidy actually went and laid down in the Treat Lady's bag. The Treat Lady worked around her for a bit but then had to make Cassidy move aside. When Cassidy got up, she dropped me out of her mouth and I was packed in with the rest of the stuff in the Treat Lady's suitcase. That is how I ended up in Alaska.

It was the longest plane ride ever! It was my first but it was still my longest (6 ½ hours). It is really pretty nice here in Alaska with it being warm (75 degrees) and sunny (22 hours of light). The only bad thing is the bugs. They have a really bad name they call the mosquitoes here. Sometimes we have to wear nets over our heads because even the bug spray doesn't keep them off.

The hiking was really nice. I didn't have to walk anywhere. I snuck into the Boss' pack and he carried me around. The trails are not very well marked if at all sometimes. As you can see here it looks like a jungle some of the time.

We stayed in sight of rivers and creeks (I learned that from Bear Grylls) and sang loud when we came across bear scat (that's poop).

Here I am enjoying the view.

Here I am about to jump in a mountain ridge lake.

Luckily we didn't see any of the bears on the first day.

Here though is some of what we saw on the second day. The Treat Lady screeched but the Boss just kept taking pictures.

I stayed in the Boss' pack that day. I hear they eat elephants for lunch!