Photo: Vincent Valencia / Instagram
Vincent Valencia has one of the most unique homes in the world. He’s the sole resident at the top of Mammoth Mountain, where he operates and cares for the Panorama Gondola. And in the two decades that Valencia has called the station home, last week was the first time he’d ever had a specific midnight visitor inside the station. A brave bear paid him a visit.
“All the years I’ve been living at the top, I haven’t seen a bear in the building,” he wrote on Instagram last week.”(A) couple of weeks ago I chased Boo Boo out of the building. This Tuesday early morning around 3 a.m., (I) woke up to loud noises. Boo Boo was back on top of Mammoth Mountain….Now every night I’m going to need to secure the building……AWESOME!!!!…..Y’all STAY SAFE.”
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It’s surprising at first to learn that Valencia’s never had a bear find its way into the gondola station. He’s lived up there through 160 mph winds, 700-plus inches of snowfall in a season, and plenty more since he moved there in the early 2000s. But black bears are typically found between 3,000 to 8,000 feet above sea level in the Sierra. It’s rare to find them above 9,000 feet, and Valencia’s station at the top of Mammoth sits well above that at 11,000 feet.
“I need to make sure that what elements I’m in, I’m sure I’m safe,” he said back in 2023. “because, well, things will get bad fast. If something does happen, you knock yourself out, you cut yourself, you break a bone, no one’s coming up to save you.”
