A Bear Grylls Adventure 2 Read online

  Contents

  Title Page

  The Bear Grylls Adventures series

  Dedication

  Chapter 1: Stupid Insects

  Chapter 2: Daddy Long Legs

  Chapter 3: Sandpit

  Chapter 4: Giant Spiders

  Chapter 5: Water Trick

  Chapter 6: Rock Radiators

  Chapter 7: False Water

  Chapter 8: Empty River

  Chapter 9: Handover

  Chapter 10: In it to Win it

  About the Author

  Copyright

  The BEAR GRYLLS ADVENTURES series

  The Blizzard Challenge

  The Desert Challenge

  To the young adventurer reading this book for the first time. May your eyes always be wide open to adventure, and your heart full of courage and determination to see your dreams through.

  1

  STUPID INSECTS

  Sophie was on a roll. As she pelted down the pitch with the rest of her five-a-side team, she thought that this had to be the best Camp ever.

  Sophie was on the Red team. The Yellows had a good defence going. Every time the Reds got the ball halfway into the other end of the pitch, the Yellows always managed to get hold of it and boot it back. Then the Reds would take it and run back towards the Yellows again.

  That was how it had been for most of the game. They were in the last few minutes and the score was 0–0. Sophie suddenly saw her chance. She was about four metres from the goal.

  Chloe had the ball over the other side of the pitch, and Olivia, the defender on the Yellow team, was charging at her. Chloe gave the ball a desperate kick and hoped for the best.

  The ball curved up into the air, towards Sophie.

  Sophie timed her leap perfectly. She could have headed it, but headers weren’t allowed in five-a-side. So she jumped up just as the ball was starting to come down. It bumped her in the chest and fell at her feet.

  Sophie booted the ball clean into the net.

  “Goal!”

  The ref blew her whistle, and the Reds had won, 1–0. The fans cheered.

  The Yellows congratulated them. “Next time!” Olivia promised, with a big smile.

  Sophie and Chloe wandered over to the touchline together, to get their things. Fatima, who shared their tent, had been watching and came over.

  “Drink?” Chloe offered Sophie a bottle of juice.

  Just as Sophie took it she saw movement in the corner of her eye.

  The wasp came straight at her out of nowhere.

  Sophie couldn’t help it. She screamed, and jerked her entire body away from the insect. Juice squirted all over Fatima.

  The wasp flew off.

  “Aack!” Fatima stared down at her soaked front.

  “I’m so sorry!” Sophie blurted.

  “It’s not your fault.” Fatima tried to put a good face on it. “Anyone can be afraid of wasps.” She looked down at herself again. “But it was my last clean top …”

  “You can have one of mine from the tent,” Sophie promised.

  “You don’t have to,” Fatima said.

  “Yes,” Sophie insisted. “Yes, I do.”

  She started back to their tent and was soon away from all the other kids. She could still hear them through the trees. Everyone was laughing and chatting and shouting – all the usual things.

  But she was all on her own by the time she reached her tent. She didn’t like being alone in there.

  Sophie almost bottled out, until she remembered she had made Fatima a promise. She would get that top.

  Her heart pounded and her mouth was dry. She leaned forward, took a breath, and pulled the zip open.

  Inside, all the girls’ gear was in jumbled piles. It was how they had left it that morning. Sophie’s stuff was furthest from the flap so she had to climb over her friends’ things. She rummaged inside the bag.

  “I know you’ll get them all wet and dirty,” Mum had said. “So make sure you take a few.”

  Sophie scrambled through the pile until she had a top for Fatima.

  She turned to go, at the exact moment that her worst fears came true.

  A cranefly came bumbling in through the flap.

  2

  DADDY LONG LEGS

  Sophie shrieked, and threw herself back to get away from the insect. The whole tent shook.

  She tried to hide in a corner, making herself as small as possible. The cranefly swung from side to side in the air, like it was trying to block her escape.

  “Go away,” she begged it. But the insect stayed put, fussing about like it couldn’t decide whether to go up or down or whatever.

  Then suddenly it was gone. She had only taken her eyes off it for a moment and now it had vanished. But she was almost certain that it hadn’t gone out. That meant it was still in the tent. It was somewhere between her and the flap. It was perched on someone’s sleeping bag, or on top of a discarded hoody or pair of shoes.

  “Okay,” Sophie said with clenched teeth, “It’s just a daddy-long-legs. I am not going to be beaten by a spider with wings.”

  All she wanted was for it to stay in one place, so she could get out and get on with her day.

  Sophie held her breath and started to crawl for the flap. She moved an arm. Nothing happened. She moved a leg, then another arm. She shifted forward a bit. Still no daddy-long-legs.

  Maybe it had gone to sleep?

  She moved her other arm, and the cranefly took off right in front of her.

  Sophie flung herself back without thinking and with a scream. The tent shook again.

  This was ridiculous. She had to be about a million times bigger than the stupid insect. Why was she so afraid?

  There was nothing for it. She didn’t want to hurt it, but she didn’t have a choice if she was going to get out of the tent that afternoon.

  Sophie picked up a heap of clothes and flung them over where she had last spotted the cranefly. Then she crawled forward as quickly as she could, ploughing her way through the other girls’ things to get to the entrance.

  But the flap had closed. The Velcro tabs had got stuck together. Sophie almost sobbed as she scrabbled to get it open. She was sure it was behind her, ready to crawl down her neck …

  She tugged at the flap so hard it almost tore, but then it was open. Sophie shot out of the tent like fizzy drink out of a bottle. She only just remembered to grab the clean top for Fatima on the way. It would have been too bad to forget it and have to start all over again.

  Once she was safely outside she wanted to kick something. She was so angry with herself. Why did she always do this with bugs? Why? Why? Why?

  Sophie drew several deep breaths to calm herself down. But, deep down inside, she wanted to burst into tears. She hated this! She hated feeling so helpless. She knew a daddy-long-legs was harmless.

  But stupid spiders and insects just made her feel sick, and there was nothing she could do about it. She hated them all. Spiders, wasps, bees, beetles, caterpillars, earwigs …

  “I mean, what is the point?” she shouted. She wasn’t shouting at anyone in particular. Just bugs in general. “Bees … okay, bees make honey. But, you know, you could probably grow honey in a lab or something. What about all the others? What is the point of stupid insects that buzz around in the way?”

  That was when she realised a boy was there, looking at her. She turned bright red.

  Normally, when someone saw her being frightened of an insect, she tried to make a joke of it. She would say something like, “Wow, that gave me a shock, I thought it was something else,” and give a little laugh.

  It was too late for that now. He would have heard everything. He must have wondered what all the fuss was about.

>   “What do you want?” she snapped.

  He looked at her like she was weird in some way and he was too polite to point it out. Now she remembered seeing him before. They’d been gathering logs to build dens at the woodpile, and she had screamed when she saw a spider. He had heard her then as well … Sophie felt her toes curling with embarrassment.

  “I just want to give you this,” he said gently. “It’s a gift.” He held out his hand with something in it.

  “What is it?’” Sophie asked.

  “Your adventure,” he replied.

  Sophie was still annoyed, but she was curious, so she took what he was offering. It was a small plastic pocket compass. Nothing special.

  “Uh – thanks, I guess.”

  “I mean,” he added, “it helped me. It really did.” He gave her a hopeful smile, and then hurried off.

  Sophie stared after him. Then she shrugged, and stuck the compass in her pocket.

  She had the new top for Fatima, which was the main thing. But she was still furious with herself and those stupid insects.

  3

  SANDPIT

  “Come on, slow coach! The Reds are getting ahead!”

  Sophie and Fatima were in the obstacle relay race. One person from each team had to race with a baton between two obstacles, and then hand it over to the next runner. This time Sophie was on the Yellow team. The Reds had handed over their baton slightly faster than the Yellows, and now Sophie had to catch up.

  Sophie was still in a bad mood after the daddy-long-legs incident. It didn’t help that on the Yellow team was a boy called Omar who was impatient with … well, everything.

  Sophie pelted down her stretch of the track through the woods. Sometimes she pulled a little bit ahead of the Red boy. Sometimes he got a little ahead of her.

  The track twisted and turned between the trees, so everyone’s teammates could dash to the next handover point and get there before the runners, to cheer them on. But Omar didn’t cheer. Nothing was good enough for him.

  They were coming to the next obstacle. Each one was different.

  So, once the runners had to crawl under a fallen tree, or another time, they had to climb up a rope ladder, tied around a branch, and down the other side. (Sophie was glad she hadn’t got the first under logs.)

  Some obstacles meant you had to use your mind rather than your body, like saying the alphabet backwards. They always had to complete the obstacle before handing over the baton. There was a surprise challenge for the very last obstacle – the one that the last runner would have to overcome if they wanted to win. So she was quite glad Chloe had offered to go last.

  Sophie’s obstacle was a deep sandpit. She ran up to it, with the boy from the other team hot on her heels. Fatima was waiting for the baton on the other side. The pit was about fifty metres across and there were two zipwires, one for each team. Each zipwire had a metal pole hanging from the cable, with a button seat at its end.

  Sophie pelted up to her pole while Omar ran alongside her, shouting at her to move faster. Sophie stuck the baton inside her pocket, grabbed the pole in both hands, and kicked off from the edge of the pit.

  The zipwire buzzed as she hurtled along it. The Red boy was just behind her. Sophie grinned as the air rushed past her head. She could win this!

  About a quarter of the way across the pit, she felt something shift in her pocket. The baton was about to fall! She quickly took one hand off the pole so that she could push it back into her pocket. She didn’t want to lose it and have to start again. But instead of the baton, her fingertips touched something flat. Of course, she remembered, it was the compass. The one that weird boy back at the tent had given her.

  She was about halfway across the pit, right over the deepest bit.

  Something glinted in the air in front of her. She had half a second to see it.

  It was a single strand of spider’s web, shining in the sun. Coming straight at her face.

  Sophie shrieked the loudest shriek ever, and tried to twist on the pole to dodge it. She only had one hand on the pole but she panicked and let go, waving it frantically in front of her face to push the web away. The compass and baton went flying through the air. She tried to grab at the pole again, but her body was twisting and turning and her fingers bounced off the metal.

  She was going to fall.

  Everything seemed to be happening in slow motion. The compass spun in the air in front of her eyes. She could see North, South, East and West and … a fifth direction? The dial seemed to grow bigger as it flew closer to her face. In fact, she seemed to be falling through the dial.

  Sophie ploughed face first into the sand and ended up with a mouthful of the stuff.

  “Bleurgh!”

  The sand was dry and gritty and disgusting. She spat it out. Honestly, she thought furiously, what kind of idiot can’t even sit on a zipwire? She’d never felt so hot and embarrassed.

  It was all that stupid spider’s fault …

  But she really was hot. Her eyes were still screwed tight shut to keep the sand out, but the sun seemed extra bright. So bright that there was a red glow through her eyelids.

  Sophie brushed the sand carefully away from her face before opening her eyes. For some reason she couldn’t hear any of the other campers. Perhaps she had sand in her ears too. She knew everyone would be laughing at her. Except Omar, who would just be angry.

  She opened her eyes. And suddenly a very bright light flooded in.

  “Ow!” she exclaimed.

  She squeezed her eyes tight shut again, then opened them a crack, slowly.

  And then her eyes grew wide.

  She realised why she couldn’t hear the others. It was because they weren’t there. She wasn’t in the sandpit at Camp. But she was standing in sand. It was smooth and yellow.

  Miles and miles of it. A desert. All the way to the horizon. The air shimmered in the baking heat.

  She jumped when a man’s voice spoke, right behind her.

  “Hey! Get over here, before the sun bakes your brains out!”

  4

  GIANT SPIDERS

  Sophie turned around in surprise. A couple of rocks and a very tired-looking palm tree stuck out of the sand behind her. The tree cast a shadow about the size of a tablecloth, and that was where the man was sitting, with his rucksack next to him.

  His tanned face was pleasant and friendly.

  “Desert temperatures can get up to more than fifty degrees centigrade,” he added. “Come into the shade.”

  Despite the talk about baking her brains out, his voice sounded calming.

  Sophie still had no idea how she had got here, but the desert heat was inside her as well as out. Every breath of scorching air made her lungs glow. She peeled her hoody off and went towards the shade.

  The man sat quietly, looking out at the shimmering desert. The sky was bright blue without a cloud in it. The horizon was a long way away.

  Eventually, Sophie asked, “Where am I?”

  “Well, it looks like you’re on a journey …” He paused, then looked straight at her. “And I’m here to help you.”

  Then he looked away into the far distance.

  Sophie was puzzled.

  “A journey to where?” she asked.

  The man pointed at the horizon.

  “Out of the desert,” he said with a smile. “Ready for some real adventure?”

  Sophie looked around at the baking sands. No sign of any kind of transport.

  “You mean, walk?”

  “That’s right.”

  This was the weirdest thing that had ever happened to Sophie. But the man didn’t seem surprised to see her, and he said he wanted to help her get back. She knew she couldn’t do it on her own, so she decided to trust him.

  She looked down at the clothes she had been wearing for the race. Hoody, t-shirt and shorts.

  “Well, I guess I’m dressed for the beach,” she said lightly.

  He frowned. “Mmm … No. Your skin’s too exposed. You want
something light and loose enough for the air to circulate next to your skin to cool you down, but strong enough to stop the desert wind peeling your skin off your body. Here.”

  He rummaged in his rucksack and pulled out a long-sleeved shirt, a pair of tough cotton trousers, and some boots like his, all in her size. Then he turned his back so she could get changed.

  “Looks like you were somehow prepared for me to be here?” Sophie asked.

  “Your journey has been calling for a while, I suspect,” he replied.

  Sophie didn’t reply. She didn’t really know what he meant.

  When she was changed, Sophie asked, “So, when do we start walking?”

  She wasn’t really looking forward to this – it was so hot and dry she couldn’t imagine how they’d ever manage it.

  “What does the sky tell you?” he asked.

  She looked up again. The sun wasn’t high up. The horizon was starting to turn red, like sunset.

  “It must be close to evening,” she guessed, “so … we wait until the morning?”

  He smiled.

  “We start now. It’s too hot to walk while the sun’s so strong in the midday heat, so we travel at the start and the end of the day. I’ve been waiting here since this morning. Here, take a drink before we get going.”

  He passed over a battered leather water bottle.

  “Take small mouthfuls,” he told her. “Hold them in your mouth to let them soak in. Then swallow.”

  “Thank you, um …” She had just realised she didn’t know his name. “I’m Sophie,” she said, as she took the bottle.

  “Pleased to meet you. I’m Bear.”

  They shook hands, and Sophie took a drink. The water was slightly warm and musty-tasting, but still refreshing.

  Just then, Sophie saw an absolutely massive spider crawling across the sand towards her. It was about ten centimetres across. Its legs were long and hairy, and its jaws were so big that she could see them.