It was raining, and that always makes it harder to tell if something is out there, the white noise can either drown out the animal noises, or your brain can find patterns in the way the water is dripping from the trees and you can end up believing that something is walking circles around your tent looking for the best way in.

I thought I heard something walk by, and chalked it up to the wind, and then I thought I heard my bear canister getting rolled around, but the burbling creek next to me made similar noises. Perhaps I should have walked it a little further away I thought. My girlfriend was sleeping softly, why couldn‘t I, was she braver than me? I was listening so intently that I felt my ears straining, and finally I figured nothing could be walking around us for that long, and nothing would waste that much energy trying to get in the bear canister, it had been at least an hour, I passed out.

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