Even the bears pay attention to the signage better than tourists do at national parks.
Our great National Park Service does a tremendous job of preserving the outdoors and safely guiding those that visit the nature areas. One of the main ways they do that is through extensive signage. There are usually hundreds of signs in each national park warning or guiding tourists through certain areas of the property.
In this video below, you’ll see that a sign in Katmai National Park does a very good job of informing tourists that bears are in the area. Like… it couldn’t have been placed in a better spot.
Tourists were hiking within Katmai – the famous Alaskan National Park – when they came face-to-face with one of the biggest brown bears you’ll ever see. They intelligently stepped off to the side of the trail to let the big ol’ bear pass on through. Getting out of the way and staying still (rather than running) is one of the best forms of self defense a human can deploy against a bear.
As the brown bear waltzes down the pathway, one man in the group can be heard practicing the other “bear self defense” method of speaking in a deep voice, and repeatedly and loudly stated “Hey Bear” at the animal. The man also mixed in a couple of “Hey Big Boys” for good measure.
In his defense… the brown bear was a big boy.
It might seem silly, but that’s one of things you are supposed to do if you suddenly find yourself in close proximity to one of these intimidating apex predators. Raising your hands high above your head and saying in a guttural tone “hey bear” is a tried and true method in desperate times (not so sure about “big boy” though).
As you’ll see, the bear initially walked past the group of people, and then came to a stop once it came to a fork in the path. Strangely enough, it looks like the brown bear checked out the sign that was located at the divide of the trail, as if it was trying to figure out which direction to go.
Once it gets done looking at the sign (which has a picture of a bear on it), the bruin turns back around and walks right back the way it came in initially. I can’t imagine what the people standing on the edge of the trail were thinking as the massive bear walked back by, though I’m sure afterwards they were all very thankful that everything stayed as peaceful as possible.
Check out the terrifying footage below:
I sure hope I never find myself in the shoes of those tourists. That right there is terrifying.
Maybe the bear thought he was looking at another bear when he came across the sign? And that’s why he stopped in his tracks and turned around? I’m not sure why it would do that though… there probably aren’t a lot of bears out there bigger than him.
Social media had fun guessing why the bear stopped at the fork in the road, looked at the sign, and then turned around. Some thought the bear was intelligent enough to get direction from the sign, while others suggested it might have been a bit of a warning to those standing just off the trail:
“Just double checking the map to make sure he was on the right trail.”
“He’s just minding his own business.”
“Even the bear got spooked by the sign warning of bears.”
“He just had to make sure his face was still on the sign.”
“Bear looks at the sign as if to say ‘You see that sign? That’s me. F*** around and find out if you want to. Have a great day.'”
That actually sums the whole thing up quite nicely.
