From the Outset - Day Nineteen

The moment we arrived at the sanctuary, we took our cameras out with the intention to shoot. We knew it might well be a busy day, and with the lack of time recently to go out and greet the bears and take their photos,  doing it at the start was deemed a good idea.

The first bears we saw were too busy to have time for us and were fighting with one another. The others, however, were fairly inactive, just chilling out in the sun and holding onto tree stumps!

Lying down behind a hill, this one occasionally popped up his head to see if anything was happening. 

This was one of the many different  positions this bear took to try and find a comfortable resting state.

Possibly for a feeling of safety, or claiming an area, or perhaps it is comfortable, this one felt the need to hold on to the stump. 

Even the dogs were lazing about, not really interested in saying hi to us in the usual friendly energetic way.

We made a move straight for the dairy and starting filling up the crates. Towards the end of our time spent with the dairy, we had masses of milk cartons to empty out into the crates and only dog biscuits to mix with it. When taking the dog biscuits out, Birgitta found some remains of a rat, what seemed like its back.

A few minutes later, when putting the biscuits in the milk, Estelle noticed little black bits floating, it was rat poo. Estelle then proceeded to take them out one by one whilst I did the courteous thing and stood out of her way.

With the whole black bag of biscuits ridden with rat poo, Birgitta used her ingenuity and got one of the crates with holes in it suggesting we pour the biscuits into the crate and filter the undesirables out. I stepped up to the task and was essentially panning for poo. The action took was successful and the bears will get their clean, albeit out of date, ice cream. Happy days.

After this and eating lunch, we headed up the road in the sanctuary to clear some more leaves out of the trenches. With the road on one side and a lack of another side as there were trees and such, we just grouped the leaves together in the trench ready for pick up... and protection from the wind.

Equipped with our cameras, we took a short break and went to visit the wolves. Unable to see the wolves clearly, we walked around the enclosure and started walking down the hill. With a lack of visibility, we started walking back to restart on the trenches. Whilst walking, there was a loud sound and as we quickly turned around to see what it was, one of the wolves had actually chased after us.

I took a shot before he ran off, which he did shortly after. We walked back with the rakes and the brush and made a start on the trenches on the other side of the road until it was time to leave.

Taking a few photos on the way out, we stopped by Mia's cage (see below) to say hi and bye.

On the drive out of the sanctuary, along the dirt road, I asked Marian to stop shortly after so that I could take a shot of the landscape, one which I'll upload at a later date. Getting out the car I was greeted by one of the dogs that is usually at the water treatment plant at the start of the dirt road.

At the start of the day, when we turn onto the road, Estelle usually feeds the dogs there, this one had decided to run part of the way to the sanctuary, probably in the hope of getting some food before the other dogs! Anyway, he was calm and posed for a photo shoot.

Getting back to the apartment, we quickly headed back out to do some food shopping, getting my fruit for my lunchtime meals is an important thing to do.

That chore done, it was time to rest and rest I did.