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Zay
climber
Monterey, Ca
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originalpmac,
that photo is insane.
Ghost,
I'm f*#king dying of laughter reading your story, I thought it was so funny that you must be fabricating the whole thing (not that I would have cared!)
Then I saw the picture. Wow.
I had a pet iguana a long time ago... her name was Lizzy. I named her. I was seven.
Then we lost power in El Portal for a long time when the river ran high.
1997
She couldn't stay warm, got sick, and fell asleep forever.
:(
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Gorgeous George
Trad climber
Los Angeles, California
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A few years ago I was at the base of El Cap waiting my turn to begin the ascent. An Australian guy came up to me and began asking questions about our sport. Naturally, being bored as I belayed, I regaled him with lots of instruction with tall tales to boot. After about an hour he left, thanking me for the introduction.
A few minutes after he began to descend the gully nearby he yelled up to me: "Hey Jorge there's a beer coming up to you."
I thought maybe he'd realized I'd like a cold one and he had sent it up with another hiker.
Being barefoot, I gingerly walked through the broken talus out to the gully when to my surprise a little old brown bear came running up to me and stopped cold, not five feet from me.
He was as freaked as I, and as I turned tail and ran back to my ledge, he turned to the left and rocketed up the steep slope opposite my hideaway.
I looked down the gully and yelled to the Aussie, "It's a bear, man, not beer."
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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I would assume it takes a bit the straggle a mountain lion.e
You should see what it takes to straddle a mountain lion!
Jorge, gud one, mate!
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rtoddclimb
Trad climber
NH
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At Rumney , NH belaying my friend at the Bonsai cliff. I heard some shuffling about off to the side
that I momentarily thought was squirrels, a minute later 6 feet in front of me out from under a rock
8 young nervous weasels pop their faces out looking around like how do we get past , what should we do.
They then proceeded to follow one another up along the base of the cliff and out of sight . Then one came back to the rock in front of me into the cave part and five more came out and followed . It killed me that my phone was just out of reach behind me , I will never forget the look of all those faces nervously peering out , so cool .
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dave y
climber
Boulder
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I was sleeping along a creek once, no tent. I woke up in the middle of the night, and some animal was sleeping on my chest. A smallish animal, maybe raccoon size. I was like, "holy shit" and the animal ran off. I've got no idea what it was.
I travelled down to Florida a couple of times to see manatees. In the summer it is unpredictable where they may be found, but in the winter the inland water tends to be a bit warmer than the ocean, so they head into the fresh water. Crystal River is a fairly predictable place to see them. You can rent a canoe and paddle out, or if lazy rent a canoe with a motor. Take your snorkeling gear. It is a pretty amazing experience, they are extremely large wild animals, yet they're mellow as can be. I recommend it.
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cornel
climber
Lake Tahoe, Nevada
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Awesome thread! Most memorable is a little hard because like so many here I have spent a lot of time out in Mother Nature. Ok, here’s one. I was a third of the way up the first pitch of Zenyata. The crack widened to about an inch when suddenly I notice a few sets of small eyes peering at me. Startled, I looked closer. Tiny frogs all jammed up in this overhanging crack about 40 feet off the deck?? I was completely puzzled. What on earth? How did they get up here? There’s no way they could’ve hopped up this slightly overhung blank face. Then I had an insight. I realized that they had filtered down through El Cap. I realized that the formation Contained a fantastic internal crack system hiding life from top to bottom. That the frogs had washed down through that system. Possibly from the very summit. Wow! This colossus of granite was teaming with life Inside and out on a scale that was impossible to comprehend. I carefully moved my tiny friends aside enough to place a baby angle and move on. Yet, That insight stayed with me over the days of the climb. Continuing off and on over the following years as well.
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tuolumne_tradster
Trad climber
Leading Edge of North American Plate
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Scanned slide from my pre-digital archive...desert fox near the campfire Death Valley January 1979
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deschamps
Gym climber
Flagstaff, AZ
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The Henry mountains have the last free-ranging heard of Buffalo in the United States.
I was sleeping in my bivy sack one night and woke up to 3 HUGE shapes 15 feet away, visible by moonlight. I spooked them as soon as I woke up and all 3 proceed to run off, getting to within 10 feet of me lying in the dirt.
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Jay
Trad climber
Fort Mill, SC
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A black bear woke me up in the wee hours of the night while I slept on a sand embankment beside the Merced river just outside Yosemite (free campsite somewhere on the side of incline rd). It was digging in the sand with his back side 6 inches from my face! Scared me half to death! I went into my childish hiding-from-monsters-in-the-closet mode and pulled my sleeping bag hood over my head. I held frozen for what felt like forever (10 minutes) before I worked up the courage to look up again. When I did, the bear was gone without a peep. In the morning there was an unearthed empty can of tuna on the ground that someone apparently buried in the sand recently. Damn tourists.
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Jay
Trad climber
Fort Mill, SC
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cornel, that is mind blowing. Life is so amazing in so many ways.
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NutAgain!
Trad climber
South Pasadena, CA
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Cornel, I love that visualization!
My most memorable El Cap wildlife was walking the base and hearing an inbound missile and scraping sound. Look up, looks like somebody dropped a baseball mitt that's tumbling down the lower slabs! When it smacks the ground a few feet from me, I see it is a squirrel. I guess they're not always super-nimble. That same walk, I came upon a snake immobilized with half of a squirrel down it's throat. Bad day for squirrels.
When I was very young, my mom was a successful real estate agent in the newly developed and booming Simi Valley in mid 70s, and partying it up. I recall being at some parties where an Orangutan lived... that dude was small but really strong. One time he walked away from the table and forgot (or chose not) to let go, dragging the table and whatever illicit substances were on it with him, leaving folks sitting in a circle facing each other. For a young kid, that was a cool and wild life.
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clifff
Mountain climber
golden, rollin hills of California
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We were up about 10 pitches on the Direct NW Face of HalfDome; bivying on that thin ledge with the railing; just settling down for the night when my partner cries out: "Augh something just ran across my face!!" Turning on our headlamps we expect to see the notorious rope eating rodent, the Woodrat reputed to live there. Looking down, there, stuck to the vertical rock was a small frog. They can climb even overhanging rock with ease.
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ECF
Big Wall climber
Ridgway CO
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Lions, tiger sharks, and bears...oh my!
Yeah all that, but have you ever see a stoat?
I didn’t even know they existed until one ran out of my woodpile.
I thought someone’s pet ferret had escaped.
The other day a deer came right up to me as I was gathering firewood. They are getting pretty used to me in the yard.
This morning I saw a rabbit sledding down the hill. I ran for my camera but he saw me and ran off.
Deep in the Sierra one time, I saw a bear that followed me all day. It was not a black bear, and I’m not judging that by color. I know black bears can be brown. It’s head was round and bigger than a black bear, with triangular ears. His fur was corse and nappy, a dirty honey gold color. There was a hump behind his shoulders. He was a big sonofabitch, I’d say 600-800 pounds. I was scared, really scared.
I climbed up on a boulder and set up my XGK to scare him off when it got dark. If you ever had one, you’d understand my thinking.
He circled that boulder most of the night.
When dawn came he was gone, but so was all my fuel.
I packed out of there one click less than a full run and abandoned the objective.
I don’t care what anybody says, I know what I saw.
That was either a very lost Brown, or one of the last Goldens out there.
We are so quick to think we are so smart and know everything, but then nature gives us a smack upside the head.
I reported it but they didn’t care and said “Black bears can be brown”. Yeah, I know, I studied wildlife in college, and have seen dozens of black bears and a few browns in the wild before. But she had a badge and a hat, so she must have been an expert...
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TWP
Trad climber
Mancos, CO & Bend, OR
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African Elephant, a big Tusker, Kroeger National Park. Literally got so close I could have touched his tusks. The encounter came about because of my ignorance for proper protocol where driving past a Tusker who has decided to amble up a motorway and not give way.
For about twenty minutes, daughter, wife and I sat on a road in the middle of the park, at first behind a long line of vehicles, as a Tusker made his way up the road for about 1/4 mile. Cars in front of us waited their turn and drove past the big Boy. When the Tusker got to us, daughter, who was driving, asked me, "What do I do?"
"Just sit tight and let him pass" was my answer.
All was cool until the Tusker was one step away and seemingly ready to walk on by. But no, he turned and proceeded to ram his head and tusk into the driver's side door and windshield. A long explosion shocked the Tusker as his tusk shattered the windshield, inches from daughter's face, and he broke off the attack.
We had no time to be scared as the attack caught us by surprise.
Two hours later I ran into a Park Ranger and told him the story.
"Mate, you were bloody lucky," a behemoth, sunburned man of English descent, about 6 feet 8 inches tall, and a huge beer gut. "Last week a tusker rammed a car, turned it over several times, left it a complete wreck."
"What do I do wrong?" I asked.
"You challenged him, you did. When you stood your ground and didn't run away as soon as he got close, you challenged him. You held your ground as he approached; that's a threat to him. All the other elephants saw that. He couldn't just let any challenge go, so he rammed your car. Damn lucky he just stopped."
The ranger went on to explain the correct way to pass an elephant who insists on staying in the middle of the road.
"You drive up to him slow, leave the engine running, stop about 30 yards away, and just stop. Then inch forward a few inches and stop. Repeat until you get really close. If he comes at you, piss off backward as fast as you can. When you get really close, rev the engine and gun by him."
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skywalker1
Trad climber
co
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^^^^ I'm heading to Kenya this summer to see friends and safari. I'll keep that advice in mind!!! Dang!
Cheers!
S....
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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^^^ A bloody poisonous puppy!
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NigelSSI
Trad climber
B.C.
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Climbing in josh on whatever wall has overseer, but off to the right somewhere on a no star left slanting climb, my partner Pete was leading something covered in kitty litter, brushing off what he could with every foot placement... he was swearing under his breath, and questioning his decision making when some climbers of to the left yelled ‘rope’, I glanced over to see a huge white bird flying our way. As it was about to pass over us, I yelled for Pete to take a peek. The bird, which I suddenly realized was a large owl let loose a giant sh#t, which glanced off the wall and caught Pete right in the eyes exactly as he looked up. He was no longer swearing under his breath, it was now something far greater. As I watched the owl gracefully fly away out of view, Pete looked up and screamed, ‘WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT!?!?’ I replied, ‘An owl! A big f*#king owl just sh#t on you!’ ‘Oh cool! Is it gone?’ It was a clean lead apart from the eye bound feces.
Same trip a couple days later, I was following Pete up a corner, and came to a horizontal crack. I peeked over, and a large rattler was staring me right in the eyes over the top of his coils from a couple feet away... ‘Pete! There’s a big snake in here!’
‘I know!’
‘Why didn’t you warn me!?’
‘You wouldn’t have wanted to follow!’
‘.....’
I hate snakes so bad! They’re great and all when I see them from a few hundred feet away and I can approach slowly over the course of an afternoon to appreciate their beauty, otherwise I cry a little bit inside. The rattle worm stayed cool as I moved slowly past thankfully, although I was sure he wanted to bite me in the eye. I stole beer from Pete after he fell asleep that night to make things fair. I told him it was a few ladies so as not to break the trust of my partner.
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cragnshag
Social climber
Gilroy
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About a year ago in San Francisco I saw this crazy bum standing at the very corner of Folsom and First, facing the center of the intersection. He proceeded to pull out his wang and took a long wiz on the street. Dude had pretty good water pressure for an older guy.
This was the morning rush hour, mind you. With cars and bikes and dozens of pedestrians all over the place. Nobody even batted an eye. Urban wildlife par for the course in SF...
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