Strangers in the Night

One day on our recent trip up Lake Winnipeg, we were excited to see both moose and bear tracks on the beach. We photographed them but didn’t give them another thought. Our bad! I usually put my tent up somewhat far from the other two tents because the noise of my canoemates prevents me from sleeping well. That night I was sleeping soundly in my tent a ways down the beach, butted up against the forest. Suddenly the tent shook, accompanied by a whooshing sound. It woke me up and I thought to myself, “Something just bumped into a guy line on my tent.” I heard nothing else, and decided to go back to sleep. I rolled over and just as I was drifting off again, a mosquito buzzed in my ear. That is not unusual in itself in a tent in Canada in June, but soon there was another mosquito in my other ear. Within a minute there were hundreds of mosquitoes meddling with me, and that did get my attention. I thought to myself, “What is going on here?” At that point I opened my eyes. Right above my face I could see starry skies. I surmise that a bear walked by, saw a big lump in his path, and took an exploratory swipe at it. The tent fly was ripped and the inside netting had five claw marks in it. With all those mosquitoes inside my tent, it was obvious I was not going to get back to sleep. So I awakened my two Debs at 3:30 a.m. and told them we had to leave because there was a bear on the premises. We packed up in the semi- twilight and shoved off an hour later. Lesson learned: don’t camp where bear tracks are present. Duh!

Addenda: 1) I did not have food in my tent; 2) I repaired the tent the next day with duct tape and needle and thread and a patch made from a ripped up bandana.

The repaired tent