Rainforest of Horror, a Tale by Beatrice

Nature and I have never been the closest friends. When I was younger I enjoyed the occasional trek through the wilderness and I really didn’t care if I got sweaty or if a bug landed on me. But when I reached the years of makeup and hair straighteners I soon realized that nature is not a friend to my vanity. Now, as a general rule, I don’t hike or camp and most certainly do not swim. This prefaces the tale I am about to weave for you.



Husband and I lived in Sydney, Australia for all of 2009. In about March of that year a friend of ours offered up his home in a rural part of Australia for the weekend. We were very excited; it was going to be a nice holiday away from school. We went to the town of Robertson, the city where the movie “Babe” was filmed. There was a rainforest about a mile up from the house and we decided to hike the trail inside it. Yes, you heard me correctly. It was a rainforest: a legitimate rainforest a’la Fern Gully. Except there were wallabies and kangaroos.

I felt that considering my non-nature tendencies I was doing pretty well. The sunlight was dripping through the tree tops and the air was moist from the rain. It was at that moment when I felt something brush my pant leg. I bent down, unaware of the danger that awaited me, and pulled the leg of my jeans up to inspect my ankle. And there they were: LEECHES!!!



I immediately do the practical things and panic. I can’t help myself there are at least ten or twelve attached to my leg and even a couple on my shoe, attached through the mesh of my tennis shoe. I had no idea how long they had been on there and I was freaking out because I am anemic: my blood is so thin that if I lose even a little bit of blood I feel very sick.



I start screaming at my husband to come and get them off of me. It was a damsel in distress moment. I was crying and he was pulling them off of me. I was convinced that I was going to get a disease or bleed to death. But as Husband threw them on the dirt we were horrified as we watched them roll back towards us! One end of the leech flipped over the other as they came after us again! It was like a bad horror movie.

We ran, I repeat, ran out of that forest like frightened children. In the end I did not die of blood loss. (clearly) But my leg did bleed considerably. And the picture below is only a small example of the damage done. All in all I'd say that 40% was Physical damage and 60% Psychological.

I suppose the lesson is: if your Australian friend who has lived in the area his whole life tells you to put on knee high rubber boots before you go hiking- listen to him.