Fat Bear Week is Incredible

Starting on September 29th and ending on October 5th, Alaska’s Katmai National Park is celebrating Fat Bear Week. What is Fat Bear Week? you might ask. This annual event celebrates the park’s grizzly bears preparing for hibernation, with a 24/7 live stream of the animals available on explore.org. Likewise, people can go online to vote for their favorite overgrown teddy bear in a March Madness-style bracket.

This annual tradition, which has been going on for roughly seven years, helps bring awareness to the Katmai National Park and its 2,200 grizzly inhabitants. The competition, while wholesome, is steep. Last year’s champion clocked in at around 1,400 lbs, making for some pretty unrealistic body standards.

With all of the mayhem of day-to-day life, it’s nice to take a second to admire these marvelous beasts in their gluttonous glory. Then again, I hope we’re not hurting any grizzly bears’ feelings with this harmless competition. Lord knows they could do the same thing with Americans on the week of Thanksgiving.