18 Jan 2023
Disaster narrowly averted this morning. I was awoken at 12:30am by the sound of an animal sniffing and rustling next to my tent. My fear from a couple of nights ago of a possum getting into my bag came back, and I shot up and looked through my tent's little air vent, shining my torch through as well. An abnormally large possum (as I'm told is apparently usual in Tasmania) looked back, while hunched over my pannier full of food. After two seconds, it went right back to my bag and ignored me! I quickly got my thongs on and wrestled myself out of my tent to shoo it away. In the time it took me to get to standing right next to the animal, towering over it, it had just managed to unfurled one side of the bag. It looked up at me for a couple of seconds, clearly decided I wasn't a threat (the audacity! I will have you know I am a Very Tough Bikepacker 😡), then stuck its nose straight into my bag.
Very thrown off by this behaviour, I ran through the possibilities of what might happen if I kicked it, tried to throw it, etc. I am used to possums running away as soon as they see me, so I didn't know what to expect anymore. I certainly didn't want to get scratched or bitten! I grabbed my voile strap and made a few whipping motions next to the possum, though not actually hitting it, and it slowly wobbled away.
I grabbed the bag and looked around for any sign of awake humans to prevent an ongoing tango with the possum for the rest of the night. Luckily, a few people were still milling about in the camp kitchen and were just leaving. I went over and explained the sitch and asked if I could put my bag in their car just for the night. They were happy to do so but told me they would be leaving early around 6:30, at which point I'm generally awake anyway.
I went back to my tent to catch some z's and was awoken again at around 3am by some even more powerful and closer sniffing. This thing was so big it sounded like a dog! I lay awake ready to jump into action if the critter tore through my tent. Perhaps I had accidentally dropped some crumbs in here? Perhaps I smell like food? After maybe 15-20 minutes the possum left, I listened out for it for a bit longer and finally went back to sleep.
I woke up at 6 to retrieve my food bag from the other campers. Not a very restful night to begin my rest day. The rest of the day I did some planning for the rest of my trip and some reading and napping.
Comments