Where there’s jungle, there’s nasty creepy crawly creatures lurking to sting, bite, or paralyze you.
Or at least that’s what we’re led to believe when listening to local guides with a macabre sense of humour.
During my travels, I’ve survived encounters with deadly Fijian sea snakes, tarantulas in Australia’s Outback, and even a face-to-face stare down with some local Vancouver deer.
So I suppose it was only the universe balancing itself out when it decided to hide a wayward scorpion in my T-shirt on my Costa Rica honeymoon.
The setting: lush, thick jungle miles away from the nearest city. The accommodation: Pacuare Lodge, a stunning eco-location offering beautiful bungalows and no electricity.
A Unknown Assailant
On our first morning at the lodge, Karen and I decided to go for a hike with our guide. My shirt had gotten wet from the previous day of rafting, so I’d left it to dry on the outside patio, where I retrieved it when dressing for our hike. I threw the shirt on and began walking down the stone path.
Suddenly: a painful jab in my shoulder. I spun around. Had something landed on me? Perhaps a rabid humming-bird or giant mosquito? Again, a jab. No, a sting! Multiple stings!
I spun around like a man possessed, ripping off my T-shirt and throwing it to the ground in a single motion. The stinging immediately stopped, revealing the assailant must have been between the shirt and my skin.
I cautiously used a stick to push aside the fabric, showing a particularly smug scorpion nestled in my clothing. “It’s a scorpion!” I exclaimed to Karen.
She immediately flew into a frenzy, fearing if the variety in Costa Rica were as poisonous as their Mexican and Australian cousins.
We ran to find our guide, Pascal. Breathless, I mouthed “Scorpion! Stung me! Am I dead?” He checked my scars, asked if I was allergic to scorpion stings. “I dunno,” replied. “I’ve never been stung by a scorpion before.”
“Okay,” he said. “I think you’ll be okay. But just so you know, the pain will get worse for a few hours before it gets better.” He made a upward incline with his hand to illustrate. Comforting, I thought.
A Lesson Learned
Was it as painful as he described? Yes. Did that stop me from asking Karen to take a few photos after I knew my life would be spared? Of course not. These are the experiences that make good stories later.
And on top of that, the attack had put “the fear” into us for the rest of the trip, compelling us to be extra cautious to avoid the snakes, bullet ants, and other crawlies that made their homes in the jungle.
What about you? Sparing anything too grisly, what’s the worst insect/animal attack you’ve been privileged to experience?
Share your stories in the comments!
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Hmmm…an assertive trigger-fish in Okinawa was probably the worst.
If you don’t count amoebas.
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Leeches in Borneo. Nasty, wriggly little things.
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Another scorpion while camping in Tasmania it was in my sleeping bag and got me on the chest. Fortunately it wasn’t as big as your’s nor as painful by the sound of it.
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an Emu. Standing at a pay phone in Exmouth, Australia. Sweating from every pore in my body due to the 40+ degree heat, having a lovely chat and then suddenly,, “Ca-CAAAWWWW” and i whip around to come face to face with a damn Emu, the largest and most stupid birds ever.
So poor darling on the other end of the phone heard this bird-screech and then me screaming “holyshit! holyshit! shit shit shit shit SHIT!” and a lot of clunking as I drop the payphone and try to hide under the phone book shelf.
i have no good denouement for this story, the emu just walked away. the end.↵ -
OH! Oh! The amoebas! THAT ONE was by FAR the worst! Let’s just say I haven’t weighed that little since I was, like, 10. Those amoebas are NASTY.
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wow, from the sound of it, everyone has an attack story to tell. i’m not sure what’s worse myself…scorpions or rabid emus…
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Hmm, I’ve been attacked by a dog in Costa Rica, been slammed by waves into the rocks in Hawaii (that doesn’t really count does it?) and I put on my shoes while camping in Washington State once to squish my toes into a big slug which was hiding in there.
But that’s not really much of a litany of attacks? Hmmm, maybe I’m not careless enough–my boyfriend would definitely disagree.
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Ouch, that emu sounds freaky. As for me, I was minding my own business on a hot sandy beach on the Garden Route in South Africa when a giant hornet raced up to my unsuspecting, unthreatening thigh, jammed its venomous sting into the exposed skin and then went on its poisonous way.
I leapt up, mouthing words my mother will hopefully never know I know, and raced into the icy sea in the hopes of cooling it off (or numbing it, preferably).
The bite became unbelievably swollen and intolerably itchy, and I was forced to resort to binge-drinking to cope with the stress of it all (ah, hooray for the memory-blurring medicinal properties of alcohol). Not something I would like to repeat.
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Another Costa Rica attack to report. I stood up after swimming a short distance in the Caribbean ocean shallows and thwack! A 6 inch long UFO arced from under the surface, slapped me hard under my nose and vanished back into the sea. I was bleeding like crazy, salt water stinging the wound. My husband along with an oral surgeon friend traveling with us and locals from the eco-lodge where we were staying dashed me to the nearest clinic, and the local Doctor pumped me full of antibiotics. Next day I had an impressive shiner and a great story to tell about a mysterious flying fish, which was probably a terrified, rather than terrifying baby stingray.
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that’s a great story! (but a painful experience). thanks for sharing Tannis.
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And people ask me why I don’t learn to SCUBA dive!
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I got stung by a scorpin while I was in Costa Rica the past X-mas. The scorpin was under the covers in my bed, it got me three times in the leg before I could get out of bed. I remember my leg swelling up and yes there was alot of pain mostly when I walked. Kind of suck to walk around the beach with kankles. O well still had a great time and would go back again.
Cheers,
Sean↵ -
When I was in the Serengeti, a hyena decided that it would be a great idea to break into our tent’s bathroom and have a go at eating my toiletries while I was trying to sleep a few yards away (on the other side of a zipped-up tent flap, fortunately). That same trip, our guide had to take our car off the park road and cut straight through the underbrush to escape from a very angry, very large bull elephant.
Less life-threateningly, I was doing a training dive in a quarry in Illinois when my instructor stopped and motioned for me to look behind me. I turned around and found myself facing a group of about 50-70 fish, bluegill, sunfish, bass, catfish and a couple of enormous pike, all directly behind me and all staring at me in the oddest way; none of them seemed to have the slightest interest in my instructor. When I looked at them, they all started to disperse and went their own ways.
About five minutes later, something flashed across the very edge of my vision. When I turned to see what it was, I found the fish mob behind me again, just like before. My instructor grinned and made a series of hand motions that roughly translated to “See those fish? They’re probably going to eat you.”
We couldn’t figure out why the fish kept following ME, and not my buddy, until after we finished the dive. We were packing up when my instructor pointed out that our sets were identical except for one thing: the tanks. Where he had a plain, gunmetal gray tank, mine was painted bright red. As far as we could figure, the fish just found something about that captivating.
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Ha, wow, thanks for sharing! I suppose my encounter wasn’t nearly so dangerous.
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When I still had braces I got stung by a bee while drinking a soda. Felt something in my mouth and thought it was one of my braces rubber bands so I reached in and pulled it out, then looked in my hand and saw a honeybee… and then I felt the soreness… right in the middle of the roof of my mouth. Not fun.
Also had one summer in Minnesota where I counted over 200 mosquito bites all over my body… they are possibly my least favorite insect on the face of this earth. They never touch my parents or grandparents, but they LOVE my young blood.
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