Any rock climbing enthusiasts out there?
If so, you might want to take some notes on how this bear at Big Bend National Park scaled this rock wall. The jagged walls of Santa Elena Canyon were steep, but they weren’t too much to handle for this determined bruin.
Sometimes the fastest way to get somewhere is the most challenging way (another way of asserting the “road less traveled” cliche). Sure, the bear could have found another way to get where it was going. Though choosing a different path would have made for a much less interesting video to cover all these years later.
The footage was posted in 2014, and was shot by a woman who was kayaking down Terlingua Creek. She must have been surprised to see a large bear trekking right up the side of the rocky terrain. You certainly don’t see something like that every day.
For their size, bears are exceptional climbers. They depend on their strength and their sharp claws to dig into trees, hillsides, or in this case, rock walls, and are slowly able to navigate their way towards the sky.
This bear really took its time as it climbed, making sure to have a good grip and even better footing before moving any further upwards. There aren’t any safety harnesses out in the wild, so this bruin was ensuring it would make it to where it was heading in one piece… rather than tumbling back down to the bottom of the canyon.
It wasn’t all seamless either. There were some slips and some not-so-smart stretches of the paws, but time and time again, the bear recovered and kept a move on. After a couple of minutes of climbing (at least on camera), the amateur, wild rock climber made it a portion of the terrain it could walk on, and proceeded to ascend in a less strenuous fashion.
Check it out:
