Bear Adventure by Anthony McGowan, Nelson Evergreen Page B

her pack, swigged and put it back.
    On they trudged, slipping and sliding, grazing their knees and barking their shins, but never pausing. More than once, their steps set off little landslides that rolled down the mountain behind them.
    Soon they stopped even trying to look up at their destination, but just plodded on, heads down, like penitents on a pilgrimage to atone for untold sins.
    And then Amazon did look up, more in despair than hope, and let out a shout of joy. Suddenly, in that unexpected way in which the seemingly impossible becomes real, they found that they had almost made it: the topmost ridge was just above them. They found the energy within themselves to run – well, perhaps it was more of a rapid stagger – up the final few metres. Just before the summit they
found themselves on solid, jagged rock and had to leave the bikes behind, but that gave them renewed vigour. Without the weight of the bikes, they felt like spirits of the air, and leapt to the top like mountain goats, yelling with delight at each bound from boulder to boulder.
    And the moment they reached the very top something miraculous happened. All the way up the skies had been a solid grey, matching almost exactly the grey of the rock. It was a joyless sky for a joyless hike. But now there was a transformation. It was as if the grey were a huge dark curtain that was suddenly thrown back, letting the glorious sun shine into a long-abandoned room.
    Now the sky was a dazzling, radiant blue, made more intense by the few wispy white clouds that clung on, like the last tufts of hair on a bald man’s head.

Amazon and Frazer stood on a flat slab of rock. Behind them was the relatively easy slope of the broken moraine field they had just ascended. In front of and below them was the great, almost vertical cliff they had skirted. The view was truly astounding. Although the mountain was modest by the standards of the Canadian Coast Range, of which it formed an outcrop, it was the highest point for many, many miles.
    From up here the two Trackers could see what looked like an endless sea of trees, broken only by the upswelling islands of other mountains. The trees were mainly the same conifers through which they had cycled – Douglas firs and pine trees. However, in the valley bottoms there were patches of broadleaf trees – ash and oak – and they were now in their full riotous autumnal glory, exploding in orange and yellow and bronze. In the distance the much higher peaks of the Coast Range snapped at the sky like the teeth of a giant wolf.
    Amazon and Frazer gazed around them, and then looked at each other, entirely lost for words. In theory they were there to look for the little lost boy, but Amazon was hoping she just might catch a glimpse of a campfire burning below somewhere, a fire that might lead her to her parents. But there was nothing but trees and rocks and glistening ribbons of water. There was no sign of human life, but the view was still sublime.
    Finally Amazon managed to say: ‘Do you think it would look this heavenly if it hadn’t been such hell to get here?’
    ‘What I think,’ said Frazer, ‘is that this is a heck of a good place for a picnic.’
    All they ate was the trail mix and a shared chocolate bar, but it was the greatest meal either of them had ever eaten. The beauty of the setting, the ravenous hunger they had built up, and that sense that they had thoroughly earned it all combined to make each mouthful a culinary joy.
    When they’d finished and stashed away their rubbish in their packs, Frazer balanced his neat little Leica camera on a pile of stones and put on the self-timer. They goofed around for a few shots. Then Frazer took some panoramic photos, covering 365 degrees.
    ‘I’ll put these up on the TRACKS Facebook page when we get back to civilization,’ he said.
    But those very words brought back to them what they were actually supposed to be doing.
    ‘Right,’ he continued, ‘let’s see what we can