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| Saw this pic online - needed to document it's truthfulness. |
I did it!
I went to Bear World and made 1/30 of my dreams come true! Seeeeee?
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| It's sooooooooo cuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuute! |
So let's talk Bear World.
I wasn't entirely sure what to expect. I knew 4 things about it before I went.
1. Bears
2. Idaho
3. It costs money
4. I was going to do it even if my arms fell off on the car ride there.
So, yes, there is an admission fee. It's not a Disneyland-esque range of wallet robbing though. Just $16. And that gets you into the park. You can drive through two parts: bear part and non-bear part.
First, non-bear part. Which, by the way, is the part where you can have your car windows rolled down. It makes taking pictures easier, I guess. Or, in my case, it let's you take a time lapse video of it.
If you watch it closely, or 100 times, you will see mountain goats, deer, bison, elk, white elk, and my sister's hand. Pretty great.
As your non-bear journey ends, the bear journey begins. Windows up - for unfun reasons like safety.
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| This picture was taken from the car - like all the pictures of the adult bears, but I'm only posting this one. |
Bear part is pretty cool. There are 58 of them at Bear World, so there are plenty of them hanging around. They were pretty sleepy when we drove through at 1:00. Fortunately, they get a little more active later in the day. Also good to know: you can feed the adult bears by paying more money, getting in a very tall truck, and throwing bread at them. Turns out - bears are the pigeons of the mammal world. Also also good to know: give the yearlings most of your bread. They're very excited about it, while the fully grown bears are not. Also also also good to know, try to drive through the areas after the tall white truck with the bread throwers, it will lure the bears out of their dens and give you a better experience.
Here's a short clip. Too bad you'll never know the end of my sister's sentence in it though.
But the best part of it all: the babies. Just as I anticipated.
If you look at this picture closely, you can see my sister's hand again. It's attached to the girl in the back taking pictures. More importantly, this bear's name is Mack and one day we will star in a sitcom together.
Things I learned about bears:
1. They purr when they eat (sometimes). They sound like motorboats.
2. These bears are 8 months old and weigh between 70 and 100lbs.
3. When you go feed bear cubs, you actually get to feed 5 - 6 of them.
4. They're pretty affectionate. They liked to put their mouths on the trainers after they eat and slobber all over. It looks like they were gnawing on the arm (kind of alarming), but they don't use their teeth. I don't know what it was exactly - teeth brushing with an arm? Sure - we'll go with that.
BUT GUESS WHAT! Once you've done all the cool things, there's still more to do. Like go to the petting area - where there are chickens and at least one sleepy deer.
You can also buy bear-shaped fries!
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| Cameo appearance by: My sister's hand. |
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| My brother and sister-in-law bought a bear family statue. |
Overall, I give bear world 8/10 bears. I asked one of the employees to tranquilize a bear and let me a hug it for an hour. He said no, so the trip could have been better.
