Part III: North Fork John Day Wilderness, contd.

On Monday, after a restless night where I worried about bears and falling trees, we decided to scout ahead on the trail. And wouldn't you know it, there was a *beautiful* campsite about 1/4 of a mile down the path. A large, grassy field; a sheltering tree; the convergence of two rollicking streams; the remains of a mining cabin; and even an old (but serviceable) outhouse. Little did we know, but it was also crawling, absolutely crawling, with ticks. (By the end, Melina and I were bitten by three ticks each, while Jeff got away with one; that's not counting the dozen or so we picked off before they could attach. Luckily they're not the kind that cause Lyme disease, though - just Rocky Mountain spotted fever. Which none of us have.)

Later that day we hiked further along the trail to the old Gutridge Mine. Melina was very excited about seeing the "scary mine," and we were all disappointed when it proved to be nothing but several large piles of rocks. Still, we did spend some time relaxing and playing along the river. That night I slept horribly, feeling ticks crawling everywhere. In the middle of the night Melina started coughing with a croupy, seal-like bark that made my blood run cold (visions of a midnight trek to the trailhead), but it was just a passing thing and never reappeared. (Did I mention that Melina got a cold on the first day of our vacation?)

On Tuesday we retreated from the ticks and headed to our Forest Service rental cabin, the Fremont Miner's Retreat at the old Fremont Powerhouse near Granite. Ironically (considering how remote we were), we had to rush out to the car and drive fast in order to find cell service so that we could call the Forest Service before 4:00 and get the combination to the cabin lock. I found a tick on me in the car; I asked the ranger about them and she said that if you want to avoid ticks, you pretty much have to stay in town.