Night Visitor
Camp 1, July 8 - While eating dinner in camp, we watched a coal train travel silently west through the valley. It was oddly quiet as it was too far away to hear. Then we watched the sun set followed closely by a thin sliver of moon. As it grew darker, we listened to the sounds around us change from bird songs to the buzz of insects. It was time to close up our kitchen, lock away the trash, and go to bed.
I'm not sure how long I had been asleep when I heard what sounded like paper crackle. It immediately made me think of a chipmunk stealing crackers. I turned my head to listen. He whispered, "Did you hear that?" I replied, "What is it getting into?" We didn't know.
I raised my hands and gave three loud claps. Silence followed. We returned to sleep.
Hours later, the sound returned. This time I was more aggressive. I leaped up, grabbing the lantern as slipping my feet into my camp shoes. I unzipped the door and stepped down the stairs into darkness. Shining the light around camp, I saw nothing out of place and heard no animals scurrying away.
With nothing to investigate, I returned to bed wondering if we had locked a chipmunk inside our kitchen.
In the morning I was awakened by the same noise. I opened my eyes to observe our visitor. Looking through the tent screen, I saw a starling leap into the air and land beak first, WWE-style, (World Wrestling Entertainment) on the buckle of our rain fly. When its feet hit the plastic awning cover they made a sound like crackling paper. Was this the source of our bump in the night?
I'm not sure if the bird was pecking at the shiny metal buckle or the red tab. I don't even know for sure if this was the same animal we had heard during the night. Maybe another animal had been after this object. The sound was the same.
What I do know is, our camp was clean and securely packed. We will need to remain vigilant with our camp cleanup, but also become more aware of sounds our camp makes. In a few days we will encounter bigger more aggressive animals near camp.
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