A friend and I encountered a female mountain lion and her two kits while hiking up to Hanging Lake in Glenwood Canyon in Colorado, back in 1977.
She knew we were there before we knew she was there. The three were above the falls watching us, we were at the edge of the lake looking down into the water (the big attraction is it is crystal clear). I thought I heard a human baby screaming somewhere, we’re looking at each other saying,“WTF?”
We looked around and she finally revealed herself above us around 50 yards away. She was burning pinholes through us, not moving, poised to jump. Scared shitless, we backed up slowly to the south side of the lake (it’s maybe 100-150 yard perimeter) where the entrance was and turned and began vaulting down the rocks back to the bottom across from the Colorado River on I-70.
It took us an hour or so to hike up and less than five minutes to vault down. She was letting us know to keep our distance from her kits and she was more than willing to attack. Incredible wild encounter.
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