 |
 |
||||
 |
|||||
 |
|
|
|
|
|
 |
||
|
|
|
|
3 | (continued) But of course every paradise has its downside: in late spring, the closer I got to the river shore, the thicker and more ruthless the mosquitoes became. By the time I passed the willow, I was in danger of inhaling the damned things with every breath. I had brought with me a light windbreaker with a hood and elastic bands at the cuffs. It was even camouflaged. This, combined with long trousers and leather gloves, became my anti-bug suit, to be worn every time I used that route to fetch bathwater from the river. Yet the little bastards still got my face, for which I had no net. Fortunately, I’m not allergic to the local species, nor did they seem to carry any diseases, since they must have stung me hundreds of times a week, everywhere I walked outside the tent, until they retired in the late fall. There were always a few in the tent after I zipped it up; their bloodstains —their stains; my blood—are still visible on the inner tent wall where I swatted them, usually with whichever book I was reading at the time. One of those books (of African travel), was appropriately entitled Malaria Dreams. Another creature I saw beside the river, by which I most certainly did not wish to be stung, was the largest spider I’ve ever seen outside a zoo. It was neatly hidden in the curl of a leaf at the top of a tall grass stem, patiently waiting. It was pale gray, almost silvery, quite hairy, and fully extended would have been at least five inches across. The little devil looked big enough to kill a raccoon, given the right venom. I had never dreamed that spiders of such size lived at this latitude, but it seemed very much at home where it was. I saw no web, but I’m sure it knew what it was about. I’m pleased to report that we never encountered each other again. (It isn’t likely that I’ll ever know its name; there are believed to be at least 1,500 species of spiders in Ontario.) |
||
|
|
|
|
|
||
|
|
|
