Even though this was an epic fail… it still goes as a backpacking first and counts toward Noah and Isabel’s total miles.

I started out 2014 hoping to get a lot of backpacking in. I scheduled every 3 weeks on the calendar for a trip. This was the first one. We were going to start earlier than last year, but that meant we had to go somewhere that was warm – Eastern Oregon.

We started our trip on a high note. We left on Friday night and got to the Lower Deschutes River Canyon campground with plenty of time to spare. The area was big flat roped off areas where you could put your tent anywhere. Luckily it was early enough in the season that nobody was there. So we had our pick and by evening we were still along. This was also our first trip with our dog, Marley. Noah was really excited to bring his fishing pole and pulled it out first thing before we even had camp set-up. That may have been our best investment EVER.

I had huge expectations and with that comes huge appetites. Noah and Isabel I think have been growing and I wanted something I knew they would like. So I decided to try grinders over the fire. Who doesn’t like salami, pepperoni, capicola, provolone, swiss, lettuce, tomato. YUM! This was also the first time the kids saw me cook our food over a fire. Let’s just say it was a tasty success and everyone ate glutinously.

I had read some online about this area and was prepared for ticks. I thought, “oh maybe one or two, I can do that.” By the time I got to the campground I had thoroughly freaked myself out and was worried from then on, little did I know.

I planned a long 3.7 mile hike. Last year our limit for the day was about 4, so I was starting the year off with high goals. In the morning before the hike, I prepped everyone with a base layer tucked into socks, shirts tucked into pants, and more than enough Lemon Eucalyptus oil on each of us to attract a Koala from Australia. I think we used almost a whole bottle on this trip, when generally we use maybe half in a season.

Because the ecosystem here is so fragile the park service has set up various outhouses every half mile or so, which was really nice. As we walked along the river we saw an unbelievable amount of Rolly Polly bugs and Noah and I started counting. He lost interest somewhere around 130.

The hike was so beautiful, I’m not sure I have words to explain it, even now, I think more in pictures and experience than in descriptor words. The grass was green and rolled in the breeze. You could hear the grass move in a rhythmic sound. The sky was more blue than I’d seen in a long time. I may be possibly a little euphoric since I’ve been cooped up inside for 9 months, but continuing on. The kids had a wonderful time running their hands through the grass that sometimes reached taller than their 40″. It was probably one of the most wonderful hikes I’ve done in a very long time. At times, it felt like I was part of the 1850’s Oregon Trail. I was happy. 

We arrived at our campsite at about 1:00 and as Will scoped out the spots and Isabel gathered firewood we began to notice these 8-legged creatures…everywhere. Will had walked down to the river and came back with at least 12 of them on his shirt. As well, Marley was covered in them. This was our first encounter with TICKS! We sprayed ourselves again with Lemon-Eucaluptus as we contemplated our options.

We had hiked to what we believed as the kids limit and going back to the car another 3.7 miles didn’t seem feasible. So as we ate our lunch and our heeby jeebies increase our freak out factor got the better of us and we decided to hike back as far as possibly and away from the river to hopefully find a better place than this tick infested area.

So what does a mother do, I became “Silly Mom”. As Will hiked ahead of us to keep pace, I walked hand-in-hand with the kids along the road back making up funny stories, funny jokes, stupid jokes, crazy words, funny actions–all in the hopes the kids wouldn’t think of their feet or the journey back towards the car. We took lots of snack breaks and a lot of side trails to fun discovery. We also saw snakes, deer, and well, more ticks. Amazingly we made it all the way back.

Before we got in the car I stripped everyone down to nothing and checked every nook and cranny for ticks. Amazing we still had ticks on our base layers even with all of our preparedness and spray. I think I was the only one who ended up with a tick bite. Will even checked Marley who was not very happy about being checked.

As we drove home, we missed a few on the dog and since Marley sits on my lap on the ride, I had ticks jumping onto me, walking across my phone screen, and thoroughly freaking me out enough we stopped at Walmart along the way home and bought more bug spray, more dog bug spray, tick bombs, dog tick shampoo and when we got home at about 11pm we were in tick-removal mode.

We spent the better of Sunday on bombing and washing and airing out our equipment, and as beautiful as the place was, I don’t believe I will be returning there soon.