Your "Trip from Hell"

[kpeter]

My trip from hell was about 30 years ago in Northern Idaho, so I'm not sure it qualifies for a High Sierra Topix trip from hell. But it was hellish!

Took place in the St. Joe River wilderness, which is a verdant, rolling-mountainous terrain at modest elevation dotted with many wonderful fishing lakes and absolutely crawling with moose, elk, deer, bear, and relatively few people.

And mosquitoes.

It was a hot, sultry July with the occasional rolling thunderstorm. The rivers and streams were magnificent.

We began to get an inkling of what we were in for when we descended into the first lake basin late in the afternoon and had to stop to pick the swarms of knats out of our eyes, noses and mouths. But as we spat and snorted and picked we discovered to our horror that they weren't knats--as nasty as knats can be, but the most voluminous billowy clouds of miniature mosquitoes we had ever seen--a new variety for us and one we had accumulated no physical tolerance.

I'm not normally overly allergic to mosquito bites, but each of these began to swell up to silver dollar sized welts. By the time we got to camp we were so driven to distraction that we were jogging to try to keep them from landing. By the time I got my tent set up (it seemed like it had 116 stakes!) one of my eyes was swollen shut from several bites and the other one was starting to go. I ducked into the tent and spent about an hour tracking down and exterminating all the mosquitoes that came with me. But the blessed relief!

It was at that point that I realized that I was hungry and needed to relieve myself. I could not see out the door of the tent--the netting was completely black. If I moved my hand to within about an inch of the netting, hundreds of little probosci began to poke eagerly through the netting. Looking out a side window, I saw that all of my white guylines were covered with rows of waiting mosquitos.

I thought if I waited until the night got cold, I could more safely come out. After waiting in torturous conditions for hours I realized that the night was never going to get cold. And you can guess the rest.

The trip was originally scheduled to be 5 days long. We made it out in 3. The DEET ran out at the end of the 2nd day. I spent the first couple of days at home soaking in colloidal oatmeal baths as if I were covered in a poison ivy rash.