Big sister Mt. Rainier gets all the tourists; we spent the day at Mt. Adams, not that much shorter, and saw no one.

Because it’s more obscure, we had a harder time finding the trailhead. I did a lot of fumbling around on dusty gravel roads. One turned to a rutted potholed mess, and I had to slowly back out until we got to a point where I could turn around.

Finally at the trailhead, we were immediately attacked by 489,298,285 mosquitoes. We hurriedly applied repellent, but we still got bit repeatedly. I’m sort of itchy all over. While it’s late July, there was still lots of snow all over the trail – that’s why there were so many bugs – all that puddling snowmelt makes for a fine breeding ground. We ate lunch on the banks of Adams Creek which had patches of snow and ice through its entire course. We hiked until the intercept with the Pacific Crest Trail, then continued another quarter mile or before turning around.

Total miles was something like 5.8.