Blog w języku polskim: http://ontario-nature-polish.blogspot.com/2022/11/grundy-lake-provincial-park-ontario.html
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| For some reasons, I always think that this sign says, "You are in BEER country"! |
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| The bear is examining our neighbor's bench |
At the end of June 2022, my two friends and I went camping for a few days to Grundy Lake Provincial Park, 330 km north of Toronto. Over the last 25 years I have stayed in this park many times; on a couple of occasions I spent one night before and after canoe trips on the French River. The park has several lakes, hundreds of camping places and just across the park entrance there is a General Store that also rents canoes (and even delivers them to the park) - that's where we bought our canoe in July 2010! By the way, a few years ago the whole establishment had relocated a kilometer to the east because the new Highway 400 will pass through its former location soon, replacing the existing two-lane Road #69. In fact, a new stretch of Highway 400 had already been built near my favorite restaurant, “The Hungry Bear”, located north of the French River. Unfortunately, accessing roadside businesses - restaurants, shops, motels, and marinas - has now become more difficult and complicated, as drivers have to take the appropriate exit from the freeway and then drive on the secondary road to their destination. If they miss such an exit, the next one may be a few or even a dozen or so kilometers away, so probably a lot of people will just continue driving on.
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| The bear strode a few meters from me and again paid a visit to the campsite on the other side of the park road |
Our campsite #318 turned out to
be quite private, especially since the two adjacent campsites remained vacant.
However, the highlight of our trip were numerous visits of a black bear – in fact,
upon arrival at the park, the staff warned us about “active bears”. On the
first day, a bear walked to the campsite across from ours and after carefully examining
the table, it vanished in the forest, apparently not finding anything of
interest. On the second day, while we were absorbed in a lively conversation,
my friend suddenly said that there was a bear behind me — and indeed, it strode
a few meters from me and again paid a visit to the campsite on the other side
of the park road. But the most memorable encounter occurred the next day.
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| As I was enjoying my coffee, the bear appeared and walked around my tent |
Of course, at night we locked all the food in the car, yet I have to add that this did not protect it against bears 100%: a few years ago, in Killbear Provincial Park, one smallish bear mastered the art of breaking into cars by pushing his rump against cars’ windows! Eventually, he broke into 27 vehicles. Well, the park had to do something about it ... and now park visitors can admire the stuffed bear in the park's museum...
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| After a while the bear grabbed the whole bag full of food with its teeth and ran into the woods |
In the morning I took bags with
food from my car and placed them on the table, as well as made a delicious cup
of expresso coffee. My friends had just left to buy wood and ice, and there
weren't any other campers around. I sat down at the table and just as I began
enjoying my aromatic coffee, the bear appeared. First it walked around my tent
(luckily it didn't enter it - I'm afraid it would NOT have used the door, which
was zipped up anyway!), then approached the table where I was sitting, about to
have my breakfast. Completely ignoring my presence, it began consuming MY bran cheerios!
It didn't help that I shouted at the bear, banged on the table and on the car with
a stick, and finally honked a few times - it glanced at me curiously, keep devouring
the food and after a minute grabbed the whole bag full of food (!) with its
teeth and ran into the woods - luckily it dropped the bag and I was able to
quickly retrieve it and put it in the car. After 10 seconds the bear reappeared
and commenced eating my breakfast again (I didn't have the time to grab it). It
was simply surreal — I was practically standing 2 meters from the bear,
screaming at it, hitting the table noisily with a stick, and basically nudging the
bear with the stick — yet it didn't care at all. I had a bear spray with me,
but never once did it show any aggressive behavior or gestures towards me.
Finally, it grabbed a large package of breakfast cereals and walked a few
meters into the woods, where it consumed them for a few minutes, and then
walked away towards other campsites.
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| I was practically standing 2 meters from the bear, screaming at it, hitting the table noisily with a stick, and basically nudging the bear with the stick — yet it didn't care at all |
While the presence of this animal
did not bother me too much - it was a typical campground bear that had learned
to steal food from tourists in the park and otherwise was completely harmless -
my friend did not feel very comfortable, especially in the tent at night. On
the last day of our trip I woke up at 10 am and was surprised to see that my
friend, his tent and his car had been gone—apparently he had left for Toronto early
in the morning. Since he’d usually go to bed very late (or rather early in the
morning) and would frequently wake up in the afternoon, I was quite curious
what prompted him to leave so early and abruptly. It turned out that at six o’clock
in the morning he heard some noise — when he looked out, he saw "our"
bear wandering on the campsite. As soon as the bear left, he packed up his tent
in a record time, got into the car and drove off to Toronto!
I managed to create a short
video, showing the bear on our neighbor’s campsite and later on our campsite.
Of course, I have seen quite a
few black bears on our campsites in Canada — once we were camping on a large
island and four bears were rummaging on and around our site; one of them hanging
around for several hours every day. However, it was quite easy to scare it off,
and as long as we were occupying the campsite, it stayed away from us and our
belongings, patiently waiting for us to leave (and when we eventually did, it caused
a bit of a mess, but that's another story.) It was in Grundy Lake Park that for
the first time I came across such an arrogant and fearless bear that could not
be driven away! Most likely the park will try to trap the bear and relocate it
over 100 km to more uninhabited areas. However, some evicted bears were sometimes
able to return and ultimately had to be put down.
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| The bear apparently considered the park and its campsites its own domain! |
Blog w języku polskim: http://ontario-nature-polish.blogspot.com/2022/11/grundy-lake-provincial-park-ontario.html
