July 9th

Sky Lakes Trail by Deer Lake- 4pm
Weather: Hot! Pretty sunny with partly cloudy skies
Stuck in my head: "Take me home tonight" (ooooh, classic rock)

What a(nother) day. Tom and I slept pretty well in our very uneven, improvised campsite, with the constant buzzing of mosquitoes all night long. We were up early though, and donned our mosquito getup (baggy beige clothing from head to toe- nothing exposed) and hit the trail by 7. About 4 miles in (4 horrible, mosquito-filled miles) we encountered another northbound hiker- named Dennis. It was nice to add another body to our hiking team, and we instantly had plenty to talk about (like how bad the mosquitoes were). We spent the day hiking through thick mosquitoes and 95 degree heat, taking breaks whenever the swarms let up (which usually meant in the direct sunlight, where it was very, very hot). We were feeling pretty beat up, but decided to push on for a 13 mile day. The last two miles hurt badly, and were so buggy, but we made it to Deer Lake, .5 miles off the PCT (Dennis is camping here tonight, also). We threw down our tent and jumped inside (we seem to be making a habit of spending more than half our day hiding in the tent) until we heard Dennis splashing in the lake. He said it was fairly bug free, so we washed ourselves and some clothing. Then we realized we were severly hungry, so we cooked up some mashed potatoes and gravy in the bug-free sunlight. Today we realized that this outrageous heat (coupled with our physical exersion, and most likely other things as well) is making food seem inedible. We only ate a bit over 1000 calories yesterday, and thats about all we have had today, also. We are forcing ourselves to eat, choking down all that we can, but we just gag and feel nauseous. We are starting to feel the affect of our calorie deficiency, also, so hopefully the heat breaks soon and solves this issue.

Our tent is full of mosquito carcasses. Everytime we have to leave or enter the tent, we have to do it as quickly as possible and without letting too many bugs inside. Then we have to quickly kill all of the ones that did get inside. The bodies are starting to pile up, and its thoroughly disgusting.