Читать книгу Just a Little Run Around the World: 5 Years, 3 Packs of Wolves and 53 Pairs of Shoes - Rosie Pope Swale - Страница 10

Germany, November 2003

Something very alive, large, and struggling frantically, falls on top of me.

It’s crazy trying to get the zip open, as everything is being flung all over the place. The bivvi hits a tree, and I get a thud on the head. I drop the torch, and am squashed flat in the dark. Luckily the torch is within my grasp.

I manage to get the strained zip open at last, and almost drop dead from astonishment. I’m still frightened but can’t stop laughing either. Shaking almost as much as me and regarding me with little black short-sighted eyes, twitching his snout with fine whiskers and a pair of small tusks, is a wild boar. He seems quite young though large and appears to have collided with my home by accident. Probably out looking for truffles or something. He looks so sweet but I’ve heard that wild boars are dangerous. He’s got himself caught up with the trotters in the guy rope, which on the bivvi are very low and he’s twisting around until practically wearing the bivouac. We’re both too squashed to move. I’ve heard that when dealing with bears, which I’ve never done before, you have to talk to them, so I say, ‘It’s OK, Eric —’ (the first name that comes to mind) ‘— I don’t want any bacon for breakfast. Obelix might eat three wild boars for breakfast but not me!’

I’m so worried the bivvi will get wrecked, but he’s standing stock still now although wound in it so tightly and it’s all wedged around a tree root. I can hardly move either. It seems like hours have passed, though it’s only moments since it all began. I never ever thought I’d end up being joined at the hip with a wild boar. Finally I sacrifice one of the guy ropes, cutting it with my small knife. Eric shakes himself free as if to see if he’s really at liberty, then twists his little tail round and tears away with one last snort.

It’s well after dawn. Sunshine comes through the golden leaves on the oak trees. Everything is drenched from the rain which has stopped without my noticing.

My tent is a scene of chaos but has somehow held together, although my precious Marmite and lavender oil have blended together, putting me off both for quite some time.

I’ll never forget Eric the Wild Boar and the lesson he’s taught me. This is a multifaceted journey, not just a run. In future I put little white ties on the guy-ropes to warn any short-sighted creatures that I’m there. Wild animals don’t often attack you, but it doesn’t pay to startle them. I’m to learn that they’re not keen on a fight, as they don’t wish to become injured themselves. There’s not much joy in being an injured predator, because that way you don’t get to eat. But I have to avoid another confrontation even like the one with berry- and truffle-eating Eric, however much we’d got along OK in the end, because the kit won’t stand it.

I manage to gather my equipment together; it’s pretty muddy and needs patching. I don’t fancy sleeping in it before cleaning it up but I could do—it isn’t too bad. I pack everything and have a good 35km run to Leer, the first German town. Ahead of me is the most beautiful sight: a hotel with pretty flower-boxes, the warmth and smell of hot coffee and signs for home-made apple strudel and delicious German sausages and sauerkraut.

I reach for the emergency pack of euros my brother Nicolas gave me before I left. The manager, dressed in black jacket and pin-striped trousers, grabs my soggy, muddy backpack as if it were Gucci luggage—only 40 euros with breakfast, he says. He dances me up the carpeted staircase, showing me into a room with a four-poster bed, pointing to the spacious gleaming bathroom, plucking a rose from a vase on the way up and flinging it into the washbasin, then leaves me to it. I’m so glad he doesn’t reappear half an hour later. He’d never have recognised the place: my sleeping bags are hanging over plastic bags to catch the drops, with muddy leggings draped about the place. The great thing about hotel rooms is that the kit enjoys it as much as you do. I sink a small bottle of champagne that he’s thoughtfully left beside the bed and fall fast asleep.