Bear World

Way back in October of last year we went on a little weekend trip up to Idaho to visit Steven and Tiffany.  Or as they are known in our house, T-van and Stiffany.  (Evie still has problems with transposing consonants and this one is contagious!)

While we were there we decide to do something fun and touristy and so we went to Bear World.

It is an animal preserve for animals native to Yellowstone. The kids (and the grown-ups too) thought it was so cool to drive through this preserve and be literally feet away from wild life.  Please excuse the quality of the photographs, I got a little Mama Bear about following the rule about keeping the car windows rolled up at all times!

The crew:

In the way back; Evie, Matt, and Jake. 

(Steven was working and so joined us later)

In the middle row; Tiffany, Kaia, and Lila.

Brian was the captain and I was the official photographer of our little expedition.

All the boys were very impressed with this rack.

It is just amazing to be that close to such a powerful animal.

The deer still freaked me out. But it was a good step in trying to conquer my fear...

I got the biggest kick out of watching these bears amble down the road, completely unconcerned by the presence of cars and trucks.

So you can see just how close they were.

And the fearless workers... 

The bear cubs were my favorite though. So cute!

My mom always used to call us bear cubs when we would wrestle as children.  And after seeing them I'd have to agree...

They had a fun little area with five or six kiddie rides. Tiffany and Matt were total troopers going on them with our kids and sparing Brian and I the inevitable motion sickness.

It was so funny to watch Matt going around and around on the bouncing buggies.  He is just a sweetheart with my kids.

This was a free-fall ride.  Jake was really entering into the whole spirit of the thing, and kind of showing up the other family.  We are just really good at having fun I guess...

Once the girls saw how much fun Jake had there was no stopping them. 

Mama bear and her cubs.  

Tiffany proving she is much braver than me in the petting zoo area.  I don't care if it is a cute little baby one, I still think deer are evil.

We drove through the preserve one more time as we were leaving. The bears were much more active and we saw these ones perched on top of a lodge pole pine tee-pee.

One more for perspective.  

It was a fun day and once again we had a great time visiting our Idaho relatives. 

I don't know why it took me so long to post about this, but on a boring day like today I am kind of glad I didn't share it before now. I was really out of ideas!