TIMMINS — It’s a feeling Joe Azougar will never forget.

"I could feel his teeth against my skull. That was the worst feeling ever," Azougar, 30, said Sunday from his hospital bed at Lady Minto Hospital in Cochrane.

The day before, Azougar was attacked and mauled by a 400-pound black bear as he sat on the front step of his remote cabin eating breakfast. He was rescued by two Timmins women — campers who had been driving by on a bush road and heard his screams.

The women, whom police would not identify, were able to scare the bear away and drive the severely injured man to hospital.

"I feel good. I am in a little bit of pain, but I’m OK," said Azougar, who admitted with a grin he had been given a shot of morphine to ease the discomfort of more than 300 stitches. A photo taken by a friend on Saturday shows the hospital sheets and pillows heavily bloodstained from dozens of puncture wounds.

Surrounded by family and friends on Sunday, Azougar described the ordeal as horrible, but he said he still plans to enjoy life in the outdoors. He moved to Cochrane from Toronto last month, to set up an Internet entrepreneur business.

"I was having breakfast on my front porch," he said as he described the tiny 8-by-16 cabin located on a remote bush road, about 10 km south of Cochrane.

"Out of nowhere, I could hear this thud, this vibration on the ground. Then there was this bear coming towards me," Azougar recalled.

His dog, a German shepherd, rushed at the bear. As the two animals fought each other, Azougar ran into the cabin and slammed the door.

Moments later, the bear, having killed the dog, was back at the cabin.

"He started rushing the window, breaking the window and chipping off wood beside the window," said Azougar.

"He made it through (the window) and I ran out," he said. The bear followed him out.

"After about 30 metres, he took me to the ground." Azougar said the animal slammed him down with its front paws and began clawing and biting.

"He knocked me down and I covered my head. He took my shoulder apart, then he peeled the skin off my head and started biting my skull," Azougar remembered.

"I could feel his teeth rubbing against my skull. That was the worst feeling ever. I jammed my thumb into his eye and so he went back to my shoulder," said Azougar.

He said the bear also tried to claw his stomach, which is heavily bruised, but Azougar said it then went back to clawing and biting his shoulders.

"I was just screaming. I could feel my flesh being pulled by his teeth," he said, remembering that a good portion of his scalp was torn off.

"I just thought I was dying. He was trying to drag me into the bush, like where he killed the dog."

RESCUED BY ANGELS

Azougar said he thought he was going to pass out, when suddenly there was a lull in the attack. Then there was the sound of a car horn blaring.

"Out of nowhere, these two ladies showed up in a car. After that the bear ran away. I don’t know who they were. They just showed up out of nowhere," said Azougar.

The women told Azougar’s friends they couldn’t see Azougar at first, just the black bear. Then they noticed there was a man on the ground.

"The women that saved me, I don’t know them. I would like to know them, to meet them," said Azougar.

"If you meet them, you thank those angels for me. They are my angels. Without them, I wouldn’t be alive," he said.

Azougar said he has been told he will have to be in hospital for several more days to ensure than his wounds heal. He said he was pleased to have a visit from his girlfriend Brooke Bowerman, of Toronto, and also his mother Itto Bentayed, who endured a 10- hour drive up Highway 11 through a late spring snowstorm to see her son.

Ontario Provincial Police and the Ministry of Natural Resources responded to the bear attack call immediately Saturday. Witnesses said OPP used a helicopter to help hunt down the bear and more than half a dozen shots were heard. It was shortly afterwards that police confirmed the animal had been killed.

No one from the OPP or the MNR was available on Sunday to comment on the incident.