The Decision
We hadn’t decided what to do today but we had driven past a sign on the highway into Seward that pointed to the trailhead for Lost Lake. This was a hike that Arlene had noticed months ago when we were planning how long we would stay in Seward and what we might do while we were here. So we decided pretty quickly this morning on this hike and packed up all of the normal stuff: water bottles with electrolytes, PBnJ sandwiches, bug sprays of multiple toxicities, clothing for various conditions, the camera and phones. The drive to the trailhead took roughly 6 minutes. There were two other cars in the parking lot and a big trailer. A couple left the trailer and headed toward the trail with an unleashed dog, then returned to the trailer and immediately walked to the trail again. Arlene and I were still changing our shoes, putting on jackets and straping on packs but I anticipated that we would be overtaking the trailer couple soon.
The Sign
There was a sign at the very beginning of the trail that said dogs were allowed but should be leashed. Dogs antagonize bears.
The Incident With The Bear
Many of the trails we’ve been on have extremish vertical elements. This one had only 2000 feet of vertical and it was spread pretty evenly across the first 6 miles so we were gaining small amounts of elevation constantly but suffering through none of it. At a couple of points the trail made an acute angle with itself and we crossed little streams at the corner with the terrain on the right rising away from us and falling away on the left. At first the trail was in the trees often with a severe drop-off to a creek (on the left) but it opened up suddenly–in a matter of 4 or 5 steps we were out of the trees–into terrain with alternating sections of shrubs and meadows with wild flowers.
It was a lovely day.
Then we saw a dog coming down the trail toward us with the trailer couple trailing behind. I am not super comfortable around dogs that belong to other people so I stopped and tried to blend in with the shrubs along the path. But the dog passed without incident and the trailer couple approched saying that they had turned around because they had seen a black bear on the trail and their dog was spooked. They said the bear had reared up on it hind legs. The guy said that he had just only now put his pistol away; he had a gun strapped to his chest. I can totally imagine the dog running ahead, surprising the bear and barking at it. I was not unhappy to see them returning to the parking lot.
Arlene and I chose to continue onward still in possession of our bear spray and poor understanding of exactly how to behave in the event of an encounter. We moved slowly up the path talking loudly not so much to each other but rather to all of the bears that might be just around the bend or hiding in that bush or over that little incline. We informed all of the nearby bears that we are not actually threating and we are also not very tasty since we’re old and that the oldness itself implies that our tissues are full of toxins. We noticed a spot in the path that was clearly scuffed up and 5 feet farther up we noticed a trail of disrupted and depressed plant life as if a frighted bear just wanted to get the hell out of there. We kept on with the slow pace while loudly talking to the bears when we noticed a moose maybe 30 feet away munching in a small flat area 10 feet below the trail. It was giving us the evil eye.
Continuing even slower we passed the point where moose was closest to the trail keeping our eyes open for any baby moose that might not be close enough to mom. Then the moose went back to munching. For the rest of the hike the only other wildlife that we saw on the path was this Willow Ptarmigan and her dude friend.
The Lake And The Journey Home
After all of the bear/moose/ptarmigan shenanigans we still had 3 miles to walk to the lake. The high point was about a mile before the lake. When we arrived we found many little streamlets filling the lake and the water clear and so cold that part of the lake still had a layer of ice which can be seen as a dark strip on the lake just below the land on the far side in our usie.
As we returned to the parking lot we discovered that we hadn’t noticed the best views on the hike. This, again, was a case where we don’t have the right cameras or lens or something or, perhaps, the skill with the equipment we do have to capture what we were seeing.
Many of the meadowy areas had a variety of flowers. With the meadows and the flowers and the mountains I was wondering what you do with a problem like Maria. (That was a The Sound of Music reference. You know… the movie with Julie Andrews and Amanda Plummer’s father.)
It was only after we had returned to the AirBnb and we looking at the GPS map from Strava that realized we had really just been hiking in a straight line north, directly north of Resurrection Bay. Below you can see the bay above Arlene’s left shoulder and can just make out Seward. Above her right shoulder is a hill that apparently has a cabin of some sort. We were curious about the cabin but didn’t explore since we were starting to get tired.
The totals for the hike were 5.5 hours, 14 miles. At 5 hours 28 minutes we had seen a total of 8 other people then in the last 2 minutes we saw 7 more just setting out.
Lentil burgers for dinner.