By Trevor Greenway

She’s been dubbed “the toughest bird” of the Gatineau Valley after 73-year-old Grace Early endured more than 40 hours alone in the bush without water, food, shelter or a cellphone. 

And she said she wasn’t even afraid. 

“I just wasn’t scared,” Early told the Low Down sitting up in her hospital bed in Shawville where she is recovering from hypothermia, pneumonia and minor bumps and bruises. She added that she was always confident that search and rescue workers would find her “one way or another.” 

The Low mother of seven spent two full nights alone in the bush after she got lost on her sprawling family farm Nov. 21. She was found two days later after an army of volunteers 400 strong showed up to help look for her. 

Early told the Low Down that she was overwhelmed with joy when she saw a group of “nice-looking men” coming to her rescue. 

“I was never so happy in my life to see them,” said Early. 

The exhaustion of her ordeal has taken its toll, but it has left her sense of humour intact. While this reporter sat at her bedside, she was cracking jokes and laughing with her daughters and other family members. Despite her harrowing experience, Early said she remembers it clearly.

“The first thing I asked [the rescuers] was, ‘Does somebody have a cigarette?’” She said one of them lit one up right then and there. When this reporter asked how that first cigarette tasted, she breathed a deep sigh of relief, closed her eyes and said, “Heaven,” while her daughters scoffed and shook their heads. 

Early was driving on her 2,000-acre farm between Low and Otter Lake around 5 p.m. Nov. 21 when her truck became stuck. Already getting dark, Early got turned around and started walking in the wrong direction. It didn’t take long for fatigue to set in. It was cold, pitch black and raining, and Early had no supplies. She found a rock near a tree, wedged herself between the two and fell asleep. 

“I slept there,” said Early. “I couldn’t see because it was so dark, and my legs were just like rubber. I was so cold, my whole body was shaking.” 

In the morning, she said she got up and tried to walk some more, but she was too tired, and she decided to stay put. She said her second day was hazy but remembers finding another hollowed-out tree where she would later sleep for the night. The next morning she said she couldn’t move. She was too weak and tired, and her legs were starting to atrophy. By then, search crews were making their way through the area, and she said she could hear dogs, ATVs and the whirring of a helicopter above. 

“The first thing I heard was a helicopter,” said Early. “And to get the helicopter’s attention, I took my rubber boot off, and I put it on the longest stick that I had, and I started waving it. I was screaming and praying.” 

Not long after, Early said she was rescued by a group of volunteers. She said she remembers getting tended to by Low firefighter Ellen Rice-Hogan and then waking up in hospital. 

It wasn’t until the next day that her daughters told her that more than 400 locals scoured the bush for hours to look for her and that businesses like IGA and local restaurants donated enough food to feed them all. When asked what she had to say to her community, she was speechless. She placed her hands over her mouth and slowly wiped the tears rolling down her cheek. She motioned to her daughter Maggie and said, “You know what I want to say.”

“She just wants to say thank you,” added her daughter. “She’s so appreciative.”

Early is expected to make a full recovery and should be back at home within the next few days.

“We’re calling her the toughest bird of the Gatineau Hills,” added Maggie with an exhausted, relieved laugh.