I have seen one wild bear in my life. Five years ago.

I was on a rented bike, riding the Legacy Trail. The Legacy Trail is a 22 km long hiking and biking path through the Rocky Mountains between the towns of Canmore and Banff. It takes two or three hours to do, and I rode both ways that day with my father, who was 80 at the time.

When I’m 80, I want to be cool like my dad.

Anyway, this trail runs east-west, with the trans-Canada highway to the north, and a high fence to the south. And that day, on a little rise just on the other side of the fence, I saw a young black bear, probably less than a year old, just poking around. I didn’t see a mother bear. However, on the understanding that when you see a juvenile bear you can rest assured the mother is likely nearby and feeling protective, I kept riding. I didn’t even pause for a photo, which was unlike me. 

Fact is, I don’t mess with bears, and that fence isn’t electrified. 

But as I rode away, I had a real sense that I had seen something magnificent. A bear. I wanted to see more bears! And not garbage bears. 

So a couple of summers before the pandemic, I was on a real bear tear and very enthusiastic to discover the “Grizzly Chair” at Lake Louise, where most days someone sees a Grizzly from above. The Lake Louise ski hill has electrified fences all around it, because of all the grizzlies that share the territory with us humans. A wildlife interpretive centre at the top of the Grizzly Chair is there to help you find out all about them (along with other area wildlife, of course). I made sure my family came with me. To see bears. We watched all the way up, but nary a bear was there.

At the top of the lift we were treated to an excellent guided walk along the “trail of the great bear” (yes, that’s what they called it), where I did see evidence of of bears in the form of scat and one smooth-barked back-scratching tree. And while I didn’t expect (or want, really) to see a grizzly during the hike itself, I was very happy to receive instruction from Jasmine, our guide, about bearish habits and what to do should you unexpectedly find yourself nose to nose with one.

I took some nice landscape shots, and we rode the lift down again, my stepdaughter and I looking everywhere, repeating to each other that we really, really, really, REALLY wanted to see a bear!

We saw ground squirrels. And a deer.

So maybe I’ll see another bear some day, though my wife says she would rather I didn’t because apparently she likes having me around and would rather I didn’t run the risk of encountering any sharp cranky ursine teeth or claws. Fair enough. But even if I never see another wild one, I know the bears are out there, and that makes me very happy. The world still contains large, intelligent, dangerous and, to me, mysterious creatures—out there in the forest minding their business.

And I like it that way.