Leaving Stewart, another look at the glaciers and back on the extremely dusty, quite lonely, but beautiful Cassiar.

Taking the sharp corner around an edge of a mountain, there is a black bear blocking the way. He is standing crosswise on the right lane, blocking it completely, and with his snout facing the left lane to allow the stopping of any Miata trying to drive past him on that lane and eat any tuna inside this already opened tin can. I am not an expert on bears, but it looks like a young adult male to me. Definitely lean, though he does not look particularly hungry to me. In fact, he makes the definite impression on me of a curious bear who now really would like to know what all these cars are doing in his domain, and who is not going to take any crap.

The road, with a mountain at one side and no drivable ditch at the other, is too narrow to turn even a Miata in one step. Reverse gear may not be fast enough to outrun a bear, though I have a head start and I understand bears only make high speed for short stretches. So I am more or less prepared to make a run for it towards the bear, crashing into him with speed if needed. I raise my side windows as some sort of blockade. And there we stand, Bozo idling, and the bear looking back at him.

After a bit, fortunately, the bear has grasped the salient fact that Bozo is bigger than he is. While not moving from his position in the middle of the right lane, he rotates his body lengthwise along the lane, instead of across it. Taking this as permission of his bearship to pass, I advance at a walking pace and drive past him over the left lane. When I am right next to him, and my road ahead is clear, I cannot resist the urge to let the supercharger growl just a little bit; out of spite and since the next time a truck may not see him in time past the corner. But the bear acts quite defensive and I quickly think better of it.

The same day, I also miss hitting 2 or 3 deer, a colorful bird, and a hare. It must be the low traffic on the road.

The Cassiar is a dust bowl, with endless miles of unpaved oily road. But it is the only road I know that looks incredible beautiful even under a heavy cloud cover.

Pictures (click for larger size):