listening¾ar

On the aftemoon of the S* of July 1983. three adult supcrvisors and a group of youngstcrs set up camp at a popular spot beside l.ake Cannamena in the Ira grant pine forests ot'western Quebec about 80 mi fes north of Ottawa in a park called Lava Rand Ray provincial reserve. They cooked dinner and afterwards, in the correct fashion, securcd their food in a bag and < carried it a hundred or so feet into the woods, where they suspended it ahove the ground between two trees out of the reach of bears. About midniehL a black bear came prowling around the margins of the camp, spied the bag, brouuht it down bv climbine one of the trees and breaking a branch. He plundered the food and departed but...an hour laler, he was back; this time entering the camp itself. Drawn by the lingenng smell of cooked meat in the 1 h campers' clothes and hair, in their sleeping bags and tent fabric. It was to be a long night for the Cannamena party. Three times between midnight and 3.30 am. the bear came to thc camp. Imagine, if you will, lying in the dark, alone in a li Ule tent, nolhing bul a few microns of trembling nylon between you and the chill night air, listening t»> a 400lbs bear moving around your campsite. Imagine its quiet grunts and niysterious snulTlings, the clattenng of upended cook-wear and sounds of moist gnawings, the pad of its feet and the heaviness of its breath, the singing brush of its haunch along your tent-side. Imagine the hol flood of adrenalin, thai unwelcome tingling in the back of your arms, that sudden rough bump of its snout against the foot of your tent, the alarming wild wobble of your frail shell as it roots through the back pack you left casualty propped up by the entrance with, you suddenly remember. a Snickers bar in 2,0 the pouch. Bears adore Snickers bars you’ve heard. And thcn, thc duli thougÅ‚tt, “Oh God...that perhaps you brought the Snickers bar in here with you!" that it’s somewhere in hcre with you, down by your fcct or undcmeath you or... herc it ts! Anothcr bump of grunting head against the tent, this time near your shoulders; morÄ™ crazy wobble then silence: a very long silence and wart, shhh... yes the unutterablc relief of realising the bear has whhdrawn to 2$ the other side of the camp or shambled back into the woods. I tell you right now, 1 couldn t stand it; so imagine what it must have been like for poor little £)avid Anderson, aged 12, whcn, at 3.30 am on the third foray. his lent, of all tents, was abruptly rent with the swipe of a claw and the bear. driven to distraction by the rich unftxable everywhere aroma of itamburger, bit hard into a flinching limb and diagged hini shouting and tlailing througlt lite 3^camp and into the wood. In the few moments it took for the hoy’s tellów campers to imzip lhemselves from their accoutrements and imagine, if you will, trying to swim out of suddenly yoluminous sleeping bags, take up tlashlights and make-shifl c ndgeU undo tenl-zips with" hclplcssly fumbling fingers and givc chasc; in thosc few moments, little Daiid Anderson was dead. Now imagine reading a non-tiction book packed with Stones such as this: true taJes. \5soberly related, i ust before secting otT alone on a camping trip of your own into the North American wilde mess.