A Bear! Finally!

'I Saw A Bear!' by ALDDesigns

Finally! This weekend my husband and I took a wildlife spotting trip through the National Forest.

Fingerless Gloves - Re... Malam $26.00	Black bear animal photo... Raceytay $25.00	Autumn Leaves - Thank Y... HomesteadingRo... $11.95	Cabin BEAR Sign WELCOME... TheSnowshoeLof... $46.00
Aesthetic Voyager -Myst... PurdyPrints $105.00	The Cowl Scarf, Neck wa... SevenWhiteRabb... $20.00	Bear Sculpture, Black B... hallofdoors $20.00	Vintage real deer antle... AnnaLouVintage $19.99
Vintage Mens Shirt Larg... SwedeHeartVint... $35.00	Forest Woodland Art Blo... redtilestudio $28.00	Classic 1970's sued... yardshow $42.00	Brown teddy bear sabahnur $30.00
Black Bear Skinny Dip G... nativevermont $36.00	Lumberjack Red Plaid Fl... YellowBugBouti... $30.00	Forest Floor with Dusti... machelspencePH... $9.99	Tiny rustic ceramic for... orlydesign $17.00

Treasury tool by Red Row Studio. 

Ever since we moved to this area I've been aching to see a black bear.  It's one Florida animal I hadn't seen in the wild.  My husband and I would go hiking and look carefully for any sign that a bear had been near, but we weren't really seeing any.  We decided to go to Juniper Springs  which is a bit deeper into the National Forest.  It is a GORGEOUS park, but on the day we visited no signs of bears, however we did see an alligator.

On the way home we noticed a sign for The Centennial Trail, which is an off-highway vehicle trail that goes very deep into the forest.  Right at the opening of the trail we noticed these:

So now we knew where we would need to be looking! Lucky enough I recently got a new (to me) jeep with 4 wheel drive so this would be definitely something we could do.  Saturday morning we got up at 6 a.m. and headed out along the trail. 4 wheel drive is definitely a must because there is a lot of loose sugar sand and it's a bit treacherous at times.  All along the way we started seeing signs of the presence of bears, lots and lots of footprints and quite a lot of bear poo.

It's kind of gross, but it's nice to see we were on the right track.  We went deeper and deeper along the trail. FINALLY we saw a youngish black bear ahead of us on the road. It was large but very lanky and when it saw us it quickly ran  across the road and into the woods.  I was unable to get a decent picture but did get a photo of it's tracks.

Of course it's not something we can do all the time, it takes A LOT of gas to get back in there.  We've found another place to spot bear signs, and  it's fairly close to my neighborhood so we visit frequently. Who knows, maybe another siting is in the near future!