“It's only the wind.......”

When we went on our impromptu hike from the visitor center, he had a great encounter. The redwoods and vegetation were great, much like Muir Woods, but denser. As we were walking along talking, we heard the sounds of something moving in the bushes. We both stopped walking and talking. The noises continued and I could see some plants about 30 feet away moving, but I couldn't see what was making them move. I could tell by the way they were moving that something was there, but we'd been so loud walking along I figured it might be a person, but not an animal as we'd have spooked it. Being a little shorter, Connie couldn't see any of this and she said “Let's go, it's only the wind..”.

Then I saw a large set of horns and knew it was an Elk. We climbed onto a fallen tree and took the photo at the right. I guess this isn't real unusual in this park, but it was a first for us. He was about 25-30 feet away, the lens was set at 70mm. At one point I could smell him (not pleasant).

I took a number of pictures and then he put his head back down. I whistled and he popped back up staring right at us again. At this point, Connie decided I was taunting the animals and she started hitting the road. I think she went from thinking “it's only the wind” to visualizing us in an episode of “When Animals Attack”.