- Encounter with bear: Croatia, just outside Velebits national park
We had spent a very enjoyable 4 days in this campsite. During the night, we slept in our tent, just inside the park in a campsite. During the day, we spent our time driving into the reserve and then going for long walks from the car. It is very mountainous, but there is a healthy population of bears and other species. Having said this, European reserves are not like African ones; the best defence for the prey is to stay out of site, and the predators (likewise) keep out of sight, so as to be able to ambush their prey. This means that, far from the situation in Africa, where time spent in the wild means that you almost always have something to look at (whether this is an Impala or similar antelope, or some sort of bird). In our time in the park, we saw no bears or wolves, and indeed we had only seen deer in the far distance.
On the last day, we packed up our tent, and left the reserve to drive on to our next destination. The campsite lies right on the edge of the reserve, with just a hedge splitting the campsite and the road (indeed, my daughter, who was just 11 months at the time, had spent much of the week pushing a trolly up and down along this hedge). We had gone no more than 100m, and were around the other side of the hedge, when a bear came down the steep bank from the left, crossed the road slowly (in front of us) and crashed down the bank on the other side of the road. Our sighting had probably only lasted 20 seconds – but given the steep bank that the bear had descended, I felt it was safe to get out and have a proper look. Beyond the edge of the road, the hill sloped off steeply, and levelled out around 10m below. Looking down the into this valley, the bear had not gone far; it stopped and looked up at me, and our gaze met for a few seconds, before the bear turned and moved on fast.
This encounter was something incredibly special. Brown bears are incredibly smart (they have a similar intelligence to chimpanzees) and there is something quite special about that moment: there is a certain amount of understanding that can be shared.
