Today did not go as planned. We had long awaited the hike we had scheduled for today. An out and back to the second most dense geothermal area in the park. 20+ miles total. Not a popular hike. But. We didn’t complete it. At about two miles in the mosquitoes got bad. Like more than annoying bad. It was at that point we realized we forgot the bug spray in the car. We paused to search through bags, and came up empty handed. We shrugged, slapped ourselves and each other (to get the sucking mosquitoes off our bodies) and kept on trecking. We hiked on for another half mile and were all miserable. These weren’t normal mosquitoes🦟, but aggressive ones that worked together with one another to viciously attack. The air was thick with buzzing and we could open out mouths, since we’d most certainly ingest dozens. Our excitement for this hike had been so high, but not one of us was having fun, so we turned around. The second half was the fastest two and a half miles we’ve ever done. When we made it back to the start, we were all red and swollen with countless bites.
We decided to change plans around and ended up doing some more of the touristy stuff. And with the tourists we were. Whoa, there are a lot of people here. It’s the first park we’ve been in this summer where I feel like I need space. I spend all school year feeling that way, so it’s unsettling to feel it in a national park. We did see some cool geysers, hot springs, and other geothermal activity though. Also we saw our first up close bison who was just making his way down the road in the other lane.
Ellie isn’t feeling the best, so she and I are spending the evening in the room, while Zak and Zoe bum some WiFi off another hotel. We are hoping to do the Mt. Washburn summit again tomorrow, if Ellie is feeling up for it.
It was brave if you to turn around. That probably wasn’t easy to do.
Would you say the mosquitos were indefatigable???