What's new
By:
USCHO Fan Forum

This is a sample guest message. Register a free account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!

  • The USCHO Fan Forum has migrated to a new plaform, xenForo. Most of the function of the forum should work in familiar ways. Please note that you can switch between light and dark modes by clicking on the gear icon in the upper right of the main menu bar. We are hoping that this new platform will prove to be faster and more reliable. Please feel free to explore its features.

Minnesotans Still Arguing About the Weather...

Status
Not open for further replies.
Re: Minnesotans Still Arguing About the Weather...

In Canada once, went out on the lake fishing for a day.. Came back midday, and saw a nice big black bear looking around our pickup camper that was stationed at the end of a logging road.. I'm about 11 years old at the time, scared out of my mind.. So we watch the bear, looking for food, take a bite out of a big can of bug spray.. Boy was he ****ed but he thankfully stormed off away from the shore we were standing at. I don't think I slept a wink the rest of the trip.
 
Re: Minnesotans Still Arguing About the Weather...

The bears I have come across have definitely scared the crap out of me. They were more interested in our fish and coolers than us though. We let them have whatever they wanted.

Much more freaked when I happened across a cougar, though. Messed my shorts. Big cats don't give a *. Made plenty of noise. It just stood there and looked at us like "Haha, really?"
 
Re: Minnesotans Still Arguing About the Weather...

state of hockey said:
The bears I have come across have definitely scared the crap out of me. They were more interested in our fish and coolers than us though. We let them have whatever they wanted.

Much more freaked when I happened across a cougar, though. Messed my shorts. Big cats don't give a *. Made plenty of noise. It just stood there and looked at us like "Haha, really?"
Click to expand...

Our friends have just built a lake home in 'Sconny. The guy's brother has a hunting cabin (REALLY nice place) about 8 miles away in the woods and they stayed there while building the lake place. My friend was at the lake place working and his wife called from the hunting cabin to say there was a bear on the porch, he told her to bang pots together to scare it off. She did and it just looked through the door at her, finished sniffing around the porch, then ambled off when it was done. I still use a cooler with a tooth mark in it from when a bear ripped up the camp at the lake place while we were 50 yards away down on the lake shore in middle of the day. This is a fairly populated area with permanent, year around homes on the lake, not the wilderness by any means.
 
Re: Minnesotans Still Arguing About the Weather...

My bear encounter - or at least the one that scared the **** out of me (there have been several bear encounters that were fine) - went like this...

Long day of paddling, set up camp on Ensign Lake, ate, hung the food pack, puff, fire, northern lights, bed... perfection. :)

Woke up at about 2am to CRASH as we hear the cooking gear hitting the rocks below the food pack. At this point it's started lightly raining and it pitch black out. Heart pounding as we're listening for any other sound. The food pack had been hung in a tree down by the lake about 30 yards away and all we can hear is the drip, drip, drip of the rain.

We discuss whether we should go and scare him away and the vote is unanimous in favor of "Are you out of your farking mind!?!"

Eventually fell back asleep as the day of paddling and everything else caught up, but I remember waking up with a start about 30 times before sunrise. Every time I was sure I was going to die and was just waiting for the side of the tent to be ripped open and claws to drag me to my gruesome end.

Rational? Of course not, but it's easy to be rational when you're sitting here thinking about it all these years later. At the time, in the moment, I knew terror for my life.

Kept thinking, "I could die here, why can't I stay awake?"

Never heard another sound from our visitor though. How can something that big move through the woods so silently?

Our food pack was still in the tree but we hung it too close to the trunk and the bear simply ripped the bottom out. Everything was eaten. The granola bars were each unwrapped. Every peanut, m&m and raisin of the gorp was eaten. Every. Single. One.

The only thing to survive was a can of Dinty Moore beef stew with teeth marks in it. Yes, we take cans but we always pack them back out.

Our visitor left a few nice piles of scat (is that the term for bear ****?) as a Thank You for a full belly.

Anyway, were supposed to be in one more night and said fark it and paddled out that day and got a motel room in Ely and enjoyed a hot meal, ice cubes (how great is having something cold after being in the wilderness?), a shower and all that Ely has to offer. :)
 
Last edited:
Re: Minnesotans Still Arguing About the Weather...

When the bear ravaged our camp we had one of the little bear shaped honey bottles. We had a hard time figuring out what it was afterwards as the bear had bitten it and sucked all the honey out leaving a misshapen mass of plastic. It didn't like the potatoes though as they were left scattered around the site (need potatoes for the fish fry, you know).
 
Re: Minnesotans Still Arguing About the Weather...

We've been seeing black bears in southern Minnesota the last few years. Last year my cousin saw one only about a half mile behind my parents house. We have never had bear around before now.
 
Re: Minnesotans Still Arguing About the Weather...

Nice night for a fire last night. Just a cozy little bonfire at bbdl's:

Edit: yes, that's a couch in the background

972016_10200565271227325_493918854_n.jpg
 
dxmnkd316 said:
My most terrifying was the scariest single moment of my life. Long story short, I was alone at the tent area on Boot Lake and the nearest person was over a mile away across the lake. Black bear started moving our tent.
Click to expand...

I had the same thing happen to me on Wolf Pack Island in Voyageurs last summer. I clutched two small knives so tight as I told the bear he didn't want to mess with me. I didn't fall back asleep for another five hours.

I thanked God so many times for the few drops of rain right after I went to bed that forced me to get up and put the fly on my tent. I couldn't imagine how more terrifying it would have been if I had been able to see its eyes two feet away.
 
Re: Minnesotans Still Arguing About the Weather...

I remembered another bear encounter that frightened me a bit...

My parents retired in 95 to lake front property that they bought in the 70s up north of Eagle River, WI. They have a hot tub on their back deck and at night it's pitch black with nothing but the light of the stars to look up at surrounded by tree tops. I love going out there by myself around midnight or later after everyone else is asleep and the house is dark.

It's so incredibly silent and peaceful - definitely an instance where you can feel that weight of time as you gaze up at the constellations and the asteroid belt from the comfort of 110 degree water.


So I'm out there a couple of years ago and I hear some noise over by the bird feeders which are maybe 15 yards away. There is a metal baffle on the pole that holds them up as my pops hates feeding the squirrels. I hear the baffle moving and there is no wind.

I shine the flashlight over there and what's looking back but 3 sets of eyes - 2 belonging to cubs and one to mama. I kept the light on them as I exited the tub and stepped back into the house.

My parents no longer leave the bird feeders out at night as once the bears found them, they came and tore them down each night.


I didn't go back out to the tub again that trip, but now all is well.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top