High and breezy please!

We delay our morning start since we don’t want to face the mosquitos. And we planned two short days for Little Bird’s last days with me. It was either that or a 19 and a 12 mile before 2pm the next day with the way road access is the next two days.

As soon as we exit our safe haven we get swarmed by the blood suckers again which makes going to the bathroom less than pleasant.

We take a last look at Dog lake and continue on. The trail is quite nice and criss crosses bike trails. We are just hoping for a strong breeze to blow the bugs away.

Some trillium are turning pink now but there is still an abundance of big white ones.

We have a short road walk which is such a relief. There is a strong breeze and we are able to take our head nets off. We are both covered from head to toe and with the small climbs we are sweating a bunch. The airflow on the road is wonderful.

We decide to have our lunch at a trailhead hoping there would again be a breeze but we have no such luck. To save our sanity we set up the inner mesh of Little Bird’s tent in the parking lot. We think we can relax now. But no, it starts to sprinkle! Little Bird goes outside and tries to drape the rain fly on. This doesn’t go as planned and it’s inside out and rotated. It would have been fine if it just stayed with sprinkling but then it seems to really start coming down and the fly needs to be adjusted. Frazzled, we finish lunch and just pack up. No rest for the wary and frustrated!

We have about 4.5 miles left to the high point of the Ice Age trail and if it hadn’t been for the mosquitos we would have actually enjoyed this section. The trail was nice, the lakes were pretty, the trillium were out….. bzzzz!!!

Lookout mountain stands 1927 ft tall and there is a teensy bit of a view. The best part is there is a very strong breeze and we can hang out and enjoy the bench and the occasional sunshine. Our sweaty clothes dry out. The tent dries out. We set it up thinking it’ll be a nice camping spot but the breeze turns gusty and throws out two stakes. Better pack up again and relocate! A little ways further we find a more protected spot in the woods and set up the tent for the third time today. Now we settle in and finally relax.