I reckon a lot of long term relationships probably crumble because the longing for that wild spark so crucial to love gets channelled and confined into a single person. Impossible pressure. These relationships can't possibly hold because the need for wildness, beauty, mystery and sensuous experience was once filled not only by another human but through a hundred subtle streams that came from wild nature. This is my bet - that immersion in a living world replete with mystery, eros, and wild otherness did something for us that romance movies can't.
This is why it’s a good idea to ground marriage in adventure.
At the northeast tip of Hokkaido, the northmost of Japan’s islands, there is the Shiretoko peninsula; a mountain range covered in mist, forest and hissing tracts of volcanic ground. The ideal place for a honeymoon. My wife and I cycled there through the heartland of Hokkaido, past Lake Akan where the remaining indigenous people of the Japan – the Ainu – have gathered to attempt to preserve their culture.
The name Shiretoko comes from the Ainu word ‘sir etok’ which means ‘the end of the earth’. It has that feeling, especially when you’re looking out over the Sea of Okhostsk and the Russian islands to the North.
I was incredibly excited to be here in one of Japan’s last wildernesses. Before setting off, all our food had to be carefully sealed to keep the scents from attracting bears, since this particular region is home to more massive brown bears than anywhere else in Hokkaido. Here’s a sign showing bear sightings during the time we were there.
Packs loaded with camping gear and three days worth of supplies, we set off up the mountain, into the forest and over the high meadows.
The only sign of bears we’d seen were munched up pine cones on outcrops of rock, but that didn’t stop us securing our food every night in the steel bear-proof lockers at the edge of the campsites. Even the tooth paste had to go in.
Bear attacks are very uncommon but do they happen in Japan, and are sometimes fatal. A cannister of super strong pepper spray dangled from my hip in case we ended up getting charged. During our breaks I practiced my quick-draw, trying not to remember the article I’d read about a guy who had used this stuff when a bear attacked him, only to have the wind blow it back in his face.
Virtually all Japanese hikers wear bells attached to their belts or rucksacks to make sure the bears are aware of your presence and have a chance to evade you, which is what they almost always prefer to do. Our bell was so deafening loud we decided to wrap it in tape, dampening the sound.
‘Ah, that’s better. We can hear the birds now.’
By the morning of the third day we were beginning our descent through the winding forest paths that led back to the low lands. I rounded a corner and froze in my tracks. About ten feet in front of me was a four hundred kilogram bear, eating ants on the side of the path. He had not heard me coming.
I unclipped the pepper spray and backed away.
When I whispered ‘Bear’ to my wife, her eyes lit up. Proper awe has a good dose of fear in it. We started to edge back but the bear saw us. He immediately pelted up the hill, digging his enormous claws into the soil to help launch him up. After a massive of strength and energy, the bear hid himself behind a fallen tree, and watched us. We stepped away and bowed.
The fear and joy of that encounter stayed with me for a long time. In Britain, we killed the wild predators large enough to harm us a long time ago. There’s a kind of soul-sickness that comes with that. ‘If all the beasts were gone, men would die from a great loneliness of spirit,’ Chief Seattle once said. This is probably what brought us out here to the ends of the earth.
Bears are good at evading people. Most hikers in Japan never see them, even if they want to. Honestly, I was over the moon that we got to see this wild bear.
Then we got back to the hostel and saw saw this:
The rangers in Shiretoko have great respect for the bears, and know many of them by sight. Their great concern is that tourists will feed the bears and they will get used to human company, eventually coming into the village to look for food. The rangers do everything they can to avoid harming the bears, but occasionally, such as when a bear gets so familiar with humans that it will capsize the bins in the local school, the rangers may decide that the danger to their human community it too great.
What was this guy thinking as he moved toward the bear?
A few moments after this was taken, the bear crossed the river and came dangerously close to the hostel we were staying it. Literally running through the car park. I’d thought it’d been evacuated, but a little girl was standing on the other side of a jeep, about fourteen metres away.
The ranger fired a warning shot, and the bear ran off into the trees. Long live the bear.
Years later, deep in the rounds of domestic life, with eternal house work and children to feed, memories like this supply an invisible stream of magic to a marriage - the faerie streams that help to keep the house afloat.
Have you ever had an encounter with a dangerous animal? How did it feel?
A year ago, I walked out of my very suburban Southern California home at 7 in the morning to find a large coyote crossing the yard across the street. We both stopped, looked at each, me more surprised than he, and then he trotted off, continuing his journey and leaving me to wonder just what the Trickster had been up to. Coyotes aren't super dangerous for humans, but it is still startling to come face to face with large wild animals in our area, especially in broad daylight.