|
I used to have a really cool job as a summer student working for an oil company in Northern parts of Canada. I cleaned up small oil stains or spills, painted stuff and picked weeds. Since I worked far from home, I would work one or two weeks away, then go back home for one week off.
Anyways, even for being already far from home, I often got to drive quads or Argos to get to certain areas to work. Sometimes I was even flown out to more remote places in a helicopter. One summer I tagged along with my supervisor to help do some task which I wasn't really needed for. We both had our own quads and drove out to a well site which took quite a few hours. On our way back, after my supervisor checked some pipe or something, we stopped in the middle of a clearing to take a break. We were stuck in muskeg which is like bog and very hard to drive through. It takes a lot of skill to drive through it (which is why we sometimes were flown to certain places in a helicopter).
During our break, my supervisor looked at me and said not to freak out but there were three or four bears about half a kilometer away coming towards us. I initially was not too afraid but then we noticed it was a mother bear and her cubs. We sat for awhile trying to decide what to do. There was nowhere to go except towards the bears and we had to drive through a huge patch of muskeg just to get onto dry land where the path back was. We decided we had no choice but to start our quads and once we got out of the muskeg to just drive as fast as possible past the bears. This was also all very dense forest we were in with the exception of the swampy areas.
So we started our quads and by the time we got out of the muskeg the momma bear and her cubs were already super close. Once we hit the dry land we zoomed past the bears and back to our work truck. When I rode past the bears I swear they were only a meter away from my quad. Needless to say, once we got back, I was so terrified, my hands wouldn't stop shaking for quite some time. Now me and my supervisor have a special bond and bring up the "bears" and laugh whenever we see each other. I have been close to bears tons of times but this was far too close for me.
Another time I was quading on a nice path and a Lynx was up ahead sitting on a log. I slowed down and pulled up beside the Lynx and turned off my quad. I was only maybe two meters from it and we just stared at each other. It was not afraid at all. Then it got up and casually started down the path and I followed behind it on my quad. Going very slowly just keeping pace. I just remember how cool and full of expression the face of the Lynx was.
I had many animals experiences up north. One of my favorite experiences happened quite a few times. I once extended my summer student work all the way to December as I took a short break from school. I used to have to work at one isolated camp which was 15 kilometers away from a bigger camp and I would drive there every day by myself. One time I got stuck on the road behind a herd of caribou. They were all running on the road in front of my work truck. Living in Canada I have seen moose, deer, elk, many times. But caribou are cool and they run weird. You also dont just see a few but a massive herd of them and they were all right in front and around the sides of my work truck.
|