Hike 18

Starting point—Point Beach State Forest
Ending point—Point Beach State Forest
Distance— 2 miles (4 miles total because we retraced our steps to get to our car)
Cumulative Distance— 95.1 miles

 We managed two hikes on the IAT within a week, which certainly is a record for us. We headed back to the trail with the boys before it got too warm Saturday. It was in the 70s and sunny, a perfect day for a hike. The trail was gorgeous, through flowers and pines and one sandy patch. We saw a snake slither away and a monarch butterfly, which AJ wanted to keep following.

The only real downside of the hike was the mosquitoes. I think all of us ended up with a few bites, although they seemed to like Dave the best. The boys were fairly protected in the backpack carriers. As everyone else has said this year, the bugs are much worse than usual. Swarms of mosquitoes is the only appropriate way to describe them unfortunately. (I now understand the phrase "as thick as mosquitoes.")

 

Aside from hiking a bit faster and taking fewer pictures to minimize blood loss to mosquitoes, it was a good hike. Point Beach State Forest looks like a gorgeous park where we should definitely spend some time.

Hike 17

Starting point—just outside of Mishicot
Ending point—Point Beach State Forest
Distance— 4.7 miles
Cumulative Distance— 93.1 miles

We spent part of our Memorial Day weekend enjoying gorgeous weather in the 70s on the Ice Age Trail. The boys were comfortable in their backpack carriers, and this was the first time we've used them for any considerable distance. 

Teddy managed to snooze in his carrier, in the same awkward position that AJ used to when he was younger, so he approves of his carrier. AJ loves riding in the backpack! He particularly likes to blow the whistle.

We were excited to make it to a section of "real" trail, which we'll be on for the foreseeable future, since we don't knock off too many miles at a time. The hike along the road was nice without too much traffic. The small portion we hiked on "real" trail was beautiful, minus the droves of mosquitoes. Amazingly, we walked away with one bite on David despite not wearing any bug spray. (But we won't tempt fate next time and will use bug spray!) This was among the worst Kerry has seen for swarms of mosquitoes, but the nicely constructed boardwalk kept us off their radar unless we stopped to snap a picture.

This was a wonderful way to spend part of our holiday weekend, and we're already plotting when we can get back on the trail in June!