Big Bear...Big Bear Chase Me...

If you have no idea what that's from you were deprived...No just joking, you just need to go rent 'The Great Outdoors' with John Candy and Dan Akroyd!

Anyways, so while in Vancouver I wasn't really expecting to see anyone except maybe the handful of friends that said they wanted to come out West and visit. Cool! Out of the blue my wonderful friend Yulan said she was heading out here for a week away from home. ( I don't blame her!) And I was so happy!! lol. So Kel and I headed to Kitsilano to meet her and her brother Michael for some lunch. After a good Mexican lunch in Kitsilano we made plans to do the 'Grouse Grind' the next day.
The Grouse Grind is a hike up Grouse Mountain. They call it the grind because it's basically like being on a stair master up the entire thing. (ooo that'd be good for my butt!) I have no idea how far it is, or how long it typically takes, but my understanding is that you need to give yourself a good few hours. Yaaaa, I'm pretty sure it'll porbably take us about 4 hours. We headed to Grouse ready to climb only to be told that the mountain wasn't open for hiking yet so Yulan, Katie and I admired the timbrewolves for a little bit while Henry, Marvin and Kim waited for us to get going.

We headed to Lynn Canyon Park. The main attraction was the suspension bridge and the fact that it was FREE! :) We arrived, parked and headed towards the suspension bridge. Right before the trail for the bridge starts there is a little cafe and seating area. As we're walking towards the trail entrance a guy is yelling really loudly to all of us there (meaning the collective of everyone that was there). It took us a little while to figure out what he was yelling about because he wasn't moving quickly and his Asian accent made it difficult to understand clearly what he was yelling.

Well it didn't take long before we SAW what he was yelling about as a BIG black bear came barrelling up the road and headed right for the trail head. It seems a bit like a blur, just as it did that day, but that bear was huge and it was moving fast! I wasn't so much scared of the bear as I was worried about how it would react to all the people running from it!

We waited a little bit before heading onto the bridge.


We crossed the bridge, which was really cool. This was the first time I've been that high and realized that my fear of heights really doesn't exist anymore. I guess all those camps last summer did the trick!! Thank you Warrior! :) We hiked up or maybe down to Twin Falls where some dude was on the rocks taking everyone's 'wish' money. Still undecided about how I feel about that... I see both sides. But after that we continued along the trail along the river and stopped to make some Innukshuks. It was a wonderful afternoon spent playing in nature.

We ended up hiking all the way up to the road, which was in the wrong direction, but we were needed there. Who knew we'd be breaking into a car that day too! A lady had locked her dog and her keys in the car with no windows open. Leave it to Windsor and Leamington peeps to bust it open! But we got the dog out and everyone was happy!