July 26:Sky Lakes Wilderness

We hiked about 8 miles and took our first break at the Brown Mountain Shelter where our friends had camped the night before. We chatted with some weekend hikers who had camped there as well, and headed down the trail. We were soon walking through several miles of lava beds: huge black lava rock piled everywhere. Whoever had built the trail had gone to a lot of work to make a way through there. It snaked through the black boulders and was paved with a red lava rock making a very cool effect. We also got some great views of Mt. McLoughlin, our first big volcano as well. This is part of the beauty of hiking in Oregon. There is always a big volcano you are heading toward and one you just came from.

We hit the highway and ran into Gadget, who was hiking with his wife now for a section. We found out from him that all our friends had hitched into Fish Lake Resort a couple miles down the road for ANOTHER lunch, and therefore weren't that far ahead. This was exciting news! It was here that I first began to notice a few mosquitoes as well.

We were soon in Sky Lakes Wilderness and climbing up the shoulder of Mt. McLoughlin. Soon the mosquitoes were rampant. When we looked at the map we soon found out why. There were a gazillion little lakes...the map was covered with them for miles! It was definitely a day for DEET and a headnet.

We found a place to camp that we hoped would be better on the bug end, and set up our tarp. It wasn't long before about 40 mosquitos were inside the tarp. We realized that if we wanted to be IN our sleping bags and not dying of heat we would have to take down the tarp. So we DEETed up, put on the headnets, zipped up the bags, and took it down. It took about a milisecond for about 50 mosquitos to begin buzzing around our heads. Luckily by now we are a little used to the buggers and were able to sleep pretty good. Hey, at least they weren't cows.

Total Miles:1793.4
Miles Today:30.4
Camp 90:Sky Lakes Mosquitos

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