Frothing, Pixie Sticks, and The Hot Hot Sun


(word of warning, this is only an average blog. Sorry guys!)

It was several months ago that we went on what was to be perhaps one of the most enjoyable days of my life up to this point. Adrianna, my sister Katie, and myself went to our usual hiking spot, a not too far away wildlife reserve with hiking trails and the like. At the time, the weather was near a hundred degrees, if not more, and we were ready for an adventure, as we brought along water, beef jerky, pixie sticks, and taffy cookies. Not exactly your usual hiking fare, but it sounded good to us. And so we headed into the reserve, deciding to take a different route than usual, and see what wonderful and magnificent views the day had to offer us. It didn’t take us long to be sweltering, and soon we were going for our water. Our pleasant little domesticated trail ended abruptly and we found ourselves facing a crappy looking fence with a badly tilted sign warning us not to go through the fence as it was private property and should we cross it our internal organs would be liquefied by alien rays and our DNA would be used for genetic experiments involving hamsters and onions. We looked at each other, grinned impishly, and warily crossed the very open gate into the forbidden side of the reserve. We walked quite fast and looked around often in trepidation, lest government agents, ninjas, or some combination thereof should suddenly spring up from the tall grass and aim their hand guns or nunchaku at us. We gigglingy rehearsed our story should any authoritative figure suddenly appear to question us on our less than legal presence. It’s amazing how giddy and absurd we girls can get when we are not within the bounds of the law. We came up with several complicated excuses that became more and more complex. At one point our story was something to the effect of us being Russians with speech impediments and hearing problems, but needless to say this plan was quickly dropped and after much debate and tossing about of ideas, we finally decided to simply say we hadn’t seen the sign. Though it was determined that Katie would be the one to say that, as she was the only one of us who was a decent liar. Now I suppose we should all be very ashamed of ourselves for going in this forbidden sector, and what’s more for planning how we’d lie about it to the authorities later if caught, but what can I say? We’re young! We could be doing a whole lot worse than exploring a part of the wildlife reserve! Seeing a bit more of nature than we were supposed to was far less offensive than doing drugs, or drinking or all the other delinquent things our peers are often guilty of. Therefore I don’t think it worth it to get hung up on a little extra sight seeing.

So there we were, hiking through the narrow little trail, talking and joking excitedly about the possible punishments one acquires from being in a restricted wildlife area. It was fairly shady, but the mosquitos were out in force. It was not uncommon for one to be walking and suddenly be slapped mightily by the person behind you, who would then often utter a disgusted cry and wipe their hand off on nearby plant life. Sometimes we could get a little too spirited in our pest slapping, and there was a bit of mild injury and irritated recipients, but we were very forgiving as it was a beautiful day and we would much rather be slapped then have nasty huge bug bites, though these were unfortunately not entirely avoided. The slapping was to be a continuous activity through out the hike, and I would constantly wipe at my face and ask whoever was nearest and least exasperated with me if there was any blood sucking parasite of any kind on me, for I was paranoid of getting some really nasty bug bite on my face and would therefore have to go into hiding lest I look deformed and have rotten produce thrown at me until it went away. And so we continued our hike, swatting and twisting and hitting each other, all while sweating and roasting in the intense heat, despite the shade. It got mighty tiring with our backpacks and the heat and we often stopped to drink our water or get some jerky. We took our time and enjoyed ourselves, often going off the trail to explore only to discover barbed wire fences that prevented us from going any further. We did see some pretty herons in the distance though, and attempted to film them with very little success, which was quite irritating considering that we had practically waded through blackberry bushes to get there in the first place. And so we once again backtracked and went to our little trail again. The thing twisted around for what seemed an eternity, though it might have had something to do with our slow pace. We kept looking at things and examined a dead hawk wing and other various curiosities. Considering we were somewhere we weren’t supposed to be, we certainly were taking our sweet time! After what seemed an eternity the trail suddenly ended, opening out into a huge picturesque field meadow type thingy with grass up to our necks, all the color of straw, and lush green clumps of trees dotted here and there like clumps of raisins in oatmeal. Don’t ask me where the raisin oatmeal analogy came from, but it really does fit! It was so absolutely beautiful it could have been a scene in Lord of the Rings. And yet, I couldn’t help but feel lost. Very lost. How far did this illegal part go? Surely if we continued on we would be back in the reserve again and we could get back to the car that way. We’d already been out there for about an hour or so. And so it was decided that we would press onward. As we walked we saw a lot of dried up mud where there was obviously once a pond of some sort. It was here that there was a lot of little tiny frogs that we would stop and exclaim over. There was literally dozens of them, so much that you had to be careful where you stepped and it seemed like we cooed over every single one! No one ever got tired of saying, “Oh look! There’s one!” It was mightily frustrating though to try not to squish them, and in the end we just kinda ran through and prayed they were fast enough to get out of the way. We walked on from there, the grass nearly eye level and very difficult to wade through as it was thick and filled with nettles and the like, as well as uneven ground. We had fortunately thought to pick up walking sticks along the trail and we held these out parallel to the ground and at chest level so that it would push the grass away from our faces as we walked through it. After some mild exploration we decided that this lush scene would go on forever and that we should try to cut through to our right and find the way into the park again. But as we searched for a way out, to our dismay we found it was as if someone had put up a solid wall of thorns, brambles, and rocks. An impenetrable barrier that despite our best efforts, we could not get through. By now we were REALLY hot and tired and our water was getting low. We would walk a ways and then try to make it through the right again only to still be cut off. We were lost and we knew it. We had the video camera with us and I left my mother a short, but still touching farewell, just in case we were unable to make it back alive. Hopefully they would find the tape on our dead bodies one day and deliver it to my mother. We continued on though, still hoping for some way back. We spent an hour or so doing this before we finally admitted that going to the right was not going to work. We often had to take breaks, but when we weren’t in the sun the mosquitoes would swarm down on us like rabid vermin, obviously quite eager to suck on new victims. We would therefore only spend a couple minutes there before we were forced to run out slapping ourselves and once again curse our forgetfulness in not bringing bug spray. After what seemed an eternity we came to a barbed wire fence and some brush, and we found a way over it, hoping to be back in the park and able to loop around to the car. It was not to be so. Instead we shortly found ourselves cut off by a small river stream thingy that was totally and completely muddy and nasty looking. Still, despite this fact it was all I could do not to leap into it, and Katie very nearly had to stop me a time or two because whether or not it bore an alarming resemblance to nesquik chocolate milk, it was still wet! We muddled around for a way to cross it for about half an hour before finally realizing it was fruitless and we turned back once more, each of us knowing that we had to trek back through the long bleak and wretched heat and return from whence we came. We were each exhausted, sweaty, tired, and above all hot. Our water was nearly gone, there was no place to rest unless you wanted to brave mosquitoes, and the constant trudging through tall grass was downright ludicrous. At one point I also had the misfortune to be bitten in the hand by a spider, which only added to my discomfort as the bite swelled up and turned a nasty shade of red. I felt like Peter Parker on Spiderman, only without the superpowers and movie deals. As we continued back through the strange prairie, I happened to notice Katie’s face. It was a peculiar shade of pink, and very flushed, despite the fact that her lips bore a bluish tinge to them. She was panting and sweating a lot and I had to admit that I was getting very worried about her. We kept asking her if she was ok, and she simply replied that she was hot. I started to imagine what would happen if she couldn’t go on, and perhaps we might have to leave her here and go get help, which would be mighty embarrassing considering we weren’t supposed to be there in the first place…We decided another rest was in order and we found a good tree to sit under, where we also miraculously discovered that there were no mosquitoes in wait for us! To this day I think that must have been an enchanted tree of some kind as it’s restorative powers were miraculous. We broke out the last of the water and the pixie sticks and proceeded to chat and enjoy our rest when I couldn’t help but notice my sister’s lips. They were still blue and pale, but to my surprise I couldn’t help but notice what appeared to be little flecks of…something around it. I squinted, stared, and studied her mouth. “Katie…” I said uncertainly. “Are you…frothing?” She turned to me with wide eyes, an expression of insult on her brow. “No!!” She denied incredulously. “What do you mean frothing?” I explained and she turned the camera, which was recording, to her face so that she could look in the view screen like a mirror. “I’m not frothing!” She declared, sounding quite offended, though I swear to this day I have my doubts as to the accuracy of that statement. A short argument ensued at which point Adrianna asked about what I meant by frothing and an explanation of rabid animals ensued. In the end we decided that rabid animals and cougars were bad and that we preferred not to run across any, though I couldn’t help but wonder if my sister qualified as one of the former… I decided to drop the frothing accusations as they didn’t seem to please Katie, and in her condition I didn’t want to get her excited. Still, I kept a close watch on her mouth the rest of the hike, which thankfully turned out to be at a quicker pace than the first half had been. Our water had gone, our mouths were dry, my sister was foamy, red, and blue lipped, though she still denies the foamy part. She claims it was pixie stick dust. Hm…maybe Katie. Maybe…

I thought we were gonna die, and yet it was the most fun I can honestly say I’ve ever had. We eventually did make it back to the car, though in the end it took about 5 hours literally. We drove out barely able to walk and promptly each bought two beverages at the nearby corner store and nearly drowned ourselves right there in the parking lot. We were covered in bug bites, dusty, dirty, sweaty, and covered in bits and pieces of brush. The mosquito bites reached record proportions, to the point of near deformity, and Katie actually was worried enough about the size of one that she drew a circle around it to make sure it didn’t grow too much and therefore make a hospital trip necessary. My spider bite too worsened and hurt, but luckily eventually went away though it took a couple weeks. We had been out in the middle of nowhere for hours, in real danger of getting heat stroke and dehydration, on illegal property, and utterly and totally lost. It was the most wonderful day of my life.