Coyotes all over the place.

6pm. Cowboy camping atop Bear Mountain.
mi....?

Crazy night last night. There were all these wild dogs hunting around the mountain top where I was stealth camping! I figured by this point in the trip I would have encountered all the things on the trail. Packs of what I (correctly!) guessed of coyotes were not on my radar.

Between 9pm & 2am here was the routine:
1. Howl.
2. Crazy yelping.

This happened once every 30-50 minutes apart.

The dogs were so close to my camp site!!! 50 yards sometimes....max.

Needless to say I was pretty scared. I'm all alone in the woods. Didn't sleep much. walked slow today.

But, as luck would have it, I walked through the Bear Mountain Zoo today after crossing the bridge (Bear MTN bridge was a big deal for me).

The zoo keeper confirmed the dogs I heard were coyotes. Apparently the hills are loaded with them around here! She was able to shed some light on their behavior for me. The howl & yell mean some one in the pack got a kill. So the good news is, when you hear that, they are busy. Second bit of information, is the coyote temperament is very shy. Similar to how you might expect a fox to act. The do not attaque people. We are simply too big. The dogs weigh only 45 pounds or so. She had never heard of a healthy coyote every trying to attaque a tent or a back packer.

So there you go! I learned some things. My experience so far with wild life is that the big animals behavior must be learned from study. These coyotes are the second predator to have body language which was wildly different from what my instincts believed.

This might be starting of a new interest for me......actually....trying to see wildlife and enjoying the big animals......ug. Maybe.
Mostly I want to sleep.
Should I set up my tent.....
I always find it hard to sleep with the wind on my face...
Oh...but the stars are so lovely! And it's unusually lucky to reach a bald on such a day / afternoon when all the conditions are just right for cowboy camping under the stars:)

Oh well. I will submit to the wonder. No tent.

Two nights with little sleep.
Tomorrow I am gonna be fucked:)