Summer’s charging ahead with very little time for writing beyond the Brooks-Range blog – but that’s as it should be, all play and little work in this short period of warmth. Flowers blooming, sun shining, insects buzzing, feet moving, bears roaming – all sounds good to me. Yup, even the bears.

Enjoying the open alpine of Yoho’s Kindersley Pass. (Photo: M.Kopp)

Hiked Kindersley Pass in Yoho National Park this past week and met a grizzly bear on the way. It appeared disinterested in us as we backed off and peered around the trunk of a large tree. Quietly it moved off the trail, ghosting into the woods before our eyes.

Safety off the bear spray, canister in hand, we yelled our approach for the next kilometer or so, kept eyes open for any movement in the trees and heaved a big sigh of relief when we reached the alpine – open – slopes of the pass. Most memorable piece of wooded trail I’ve hiked in a long time.

My mind started racing with a couple of article ideas as we walked. See that’s the great thing about not working, stories can unfold even as you are out enjoying life.

What stories are you experiencing this summer?

“If one advances confidently in the directions of his dreams,
And endeavours to live a life which he has imagined,
He will meet a success unexpected in common hours.”
–          Henry David Thoreau