Mélanie and Dominic seemed pretty confident that the bears wouldn't be any trouble. It hardly made him feel any better, seeing as he knew almost nothing about bears other than the fact that they hibernate in the winter, and have the capacity to eat people. That last thought made him shudder.

"If you guys say so, then fine," Paul eventually relented, "Either way, we'll be in the car, so we'll be fine." And so, the three of them climbed into the car. There was plenty of room, even with their luggage sharing space with them. Paul kept his messenger bag with him, his laptop was in it and he didn't want it to get jostled around during the ride.

"So..." Paul began to say as they sat in the car and got ready to go, "How do you two know, er, Victoria? That's her name right?" He definitely didn't want to call her by the wrong name when they made it to the cabin and met her. That would be awkward as hell, to say the least.

As the group piled into the jeep, Paul still seemed to be worried about bears. The local girl had just been kidding right? An funny excuse to not walk alone. Dominic didn't know much about bears, but he was pretty sure they generally stayed away. "I don't know man, I hear bears really hate jeeps or something. Like bulls and the color red, you know? Just what I heard though, don't know anything about bears myself. But Mélanie seems to have the right idea. Don't bother 'em and they'll leave us alone."

Dominic turned around to make sure the baggage was all secure and not likely to fly out of the open jeep at any bump. He tucked his own backpack closer to the floor then nodded and turned around to start the engine. Over the sound of the the starting he heard, Paul ask about Victoria. "Oh Tori? Met her a few months back. She was at one of the club parties I was promoting. Hit it off, she introduced me to some people she was with. After that we kinda just became, uh, not friends, but we always say hi to each other? She's actually really cool to talk to for art and stuff. I was doing some design work for a friend of mine and she was real cool about helping me out with colors and stuff."

The jeep got moving, kicking up traces of dust and leaving behind the rest of their group in the small store. The road was not the smoothest but their slower pace meant it wasn't so bumpy that there was any real discomfort. The sun shone down, and though there was no roof on the jeep, the canopy of trees did a good job of keeping them mostly shaded. "Wait, so you don't know Tori?" he asked Paul. "Mélanie here invite you then? So you're partly the cause of that sausage-fest you mentioned earlier. Didn't think to invite any girls?"