[pct-l] Mountain Lion Encounter

[Lenka Jensen]

I am new to this site and a future thru hiker. I have actually had quite a few encounters with mountain lions. While running/hiking in the Santa Monica Mountains, I have run into these cats at least ten times in the last few years. Yes, it is scary at first, but if you don't panic and stand your ground, they always walk away. Once, while hiking a trail above Malibu, I looked into the bushes next to the trail and saw an outline of a lion, calmly looking at me. I slowly backed of while looking straight at it. An other time, while running the Sycamore trail, I saw a lion cross the trail right in front of me, I waited for a while and than continued my run. Three miles down the trail I was passed by a few bikers. I told them about the lion, only to be told that the lion has been casually tracking them. When I alerted the forestry rangers about it, I was told that it was only the resident lion, well tagged and watched. Yes, they are scary, but far less then a lot of humans. I have since learned that some forestry rangers are wearing jackets with large eyes painted on their backs. Some study was made, and the conclusion was, that lions do not attack if they feel that they are seen. Since most of attacks do happen from the back, maybe there is some truth to that, therefore my backpack will have a nice painting of two large eyes painted on the back of it.

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