Bearizona, Aug 4 (Newswire): About an hour's drive south of the Grand Canyon, Bearizona is one of those drive-through wilderness parks that are a step up from a zoo but far removed from the actual wild.
One motors along a two-mile road through 160 acres, getting glimpses of wolves, sheep, bison, mountain goats, burros and then, finally, fenced off to themselves, the bears that lend this place its name.
Windows must remain closed inside Bearizona, although none of the warning signs say anything about sunroofs, which prompts some youngsters, their game consoles forgotten, to poke their heads out for better views.
This has been a year of living dangerously with bears after a string of attacks on humans in Alaska, New Jersey, Wyoming and here in Arizona. Still, the cars continue to pull up to the front gate of Bearizona, which has been open about a year.
There are a dozen or so bears hidden in the wooded area, but one sees none at first. After peering through the trees on a rainy afternoon, though, a black figure emerges off in the distance, then another. Soon, bears of all sizes come into focus. They are not approaching the minivans and SUVs that are rolling through their habitat, but they do not seem overly concerned about the intruders either.
The bears drink from a vat of water, climb atop a manufactured cave and walk through the forest as bears do. They look very much like bears would look on the outside. Except for one.
Named Cher Bear, she stands at the fence line and sways back and forth for hours on end, as if confined in a tight cage, which the bear attendant explains had been her fate in Ohio before being let loose in Bearizona. She wanders some but always returns to the same spot to pace and sway. "It is like the bear does not fully understand that she's out," the attendant says.
This troubled bear, small and fierce but vulnerable looking, stares out through the fence into the rest of Arizona, thinking who knows what.
One motors along a two-mile road through 160 acres, getting glimpses of wolves, sheep, bison, mountain goats, burros and then, finally, fenced off to themselves, the bears that lend this place its name.
Windows must remain closed inside Bearizona, although none of the warning signs say anything about sunroofs, which prompts some youngsters, their game consoles forgotten, to poke their heads out for better views.
This has been a year of living dangerously with bears after a string of attacks on humans in Alaska, New Jersey, Wyoming and here in Arizona. Still, the cars continue to pull up to the front gate of Bearizona, which has been open about a year.
There are a dozen or so bears hidden in the wooded area, but one sees none at first. After peering through the trees on a rainy afternoon, though, a black figure emerges off in the distance, then another. Soon, bears of all sizes come into focus. They are not approaching the minivans and SUVs that are rolling through their habitat, but they do not seem overly concerned about the intruders either.
The bears drink from a vat of water, climb atop a manufactured cave and walk through the forest as bears do. They look very much like bears would look on the outside. Except for one.
Named Cher Bear, she stands at the fence line and sways back and forth for hours on end, as if confined in a tight cage, which the bear attendant explains had been her fate in Ohio before being let loose in Bearizona. She wanders some but always returns to the same spot to pace and sway. "It is like the bear does not fully understand that she's out," the attendant says.
This troubled bear, small and fierce but vulnerable looking, stares out through the fence into the rest of Arizona, thinking who knows what.
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