Natalee Dennis was sitting in an outdoor hot tub with her father, Steve Dennis, in their backyard hot tub when they heard an animal nearby.
Thinking it was a raccoon or a cat, Dennis grabbed her cellphone to use the flashlight and start filming.
“We got something down here?” her dad asked her, peering over the edge of the tub in Tofino, on B.C.’s Vancouver Island.
“Probably the raccoons,” he says as a pair of glowing yellow eyes can be seen peering through foliage. “C’mon. C’mon.”
Moments later, Dennis gets a better view, exclaiming, “Oh, it is a cougar, Dad!”
Father and daughter Steve and Natalee Dennis were relaxing in their hot tub in Tofino, B.C., when they thought they heard a raccoon nearby. Natalee started filming and captured the moment they discovered they had actually heard a cougar, sitting less than a metre away.
“It is! It is!” she repeats as her father replies, “No, it’s not” at the same time the video captures the animal’s head and upper torso peering directly at them.
“Holy shit! Ho ho! Yes indeed,” her dad can be heard saying just as the video cuts off, and the pair splash to the far side of the tub.
Dennis says her dad had encountered cougars before, and knowing what to do, they got out of the tub as calmly as possible and slowly moved inside, where they watched it for another 20 minutes or so.
“It was just looking around,” she said in an interview with CHEK News. “It really is cool.”
Many people agree: Dennis has posted the video to TikTok where it has received thousands of views and comments, many impressed by how calmly the pair reacted.
“Yes indeed,” in response to seeing a cougar mere feet away from you, is a new kind of class I aspire to achieve,” wrote one viewer.
“WAAAAY too casual,” said another.
But Wood says growing up in the area, both she and her dad are well-acquainted with how to react to a cougar even if it is staring at you while you sit in a hot tub.
“You learn about staying calm if seeing a cougar,” she said. Even so, she says, she never expected to be so close to one. “We must have been only a foot away from it … a 200-pound kitty next to us.”
There have been several recent sightings of cougars on both Vancouver Island and the B.C. Lower Mainland but, according to numbers from the B.C. Conservation Officer Service, there haven’t been any more reported sightings than average in recent months.
And while they can pose a risk, WildSafe B.C. says cougars attacking humans are rare.
The group says anyone who encounters a cougar is advised to “keep calm” and “never run.” Instead, it says you should “make yourself look as large as possible and back away slowly, keeping the cougar in view and allowing a clear exit” for the animal.
Dennis says the encounter hasn’t stopped her family from using their hot tub, but they are changing their hours for the time being.
“The rule is we’ll go in during the day but not at night right now.”