It’s July in Alaska. Alaskans are enjoying God’s creation and attempting to wring every ounce of enjoyment from each summer day. You can wring a lot of fun out of 18 hours of sunshine.

However, along with the sunshine, there are two additional arrivals.

Tourists and mosquitoes.

Now, at first glance, it wouldn’t seem that tourists and mosquitoes have a lot in common. As an Alaskan who has intimate knowledge of both the tourist and the mosquito, I’ve noticed a few shared characteristics.

• They are everywhere.

The curator of insects at the University of Alaska Museum of the North has estimated the number of mosquitoes in Alaska at about 17,489,393,939,393 mosquitoes. Seventeen.Trillion. Mosquitoes. Twenty-two million mosquitoes per resident.

A friend recently remarked that she had gone for a walk and it was “raining skeeters.” Yes, the mosquitoes can be so thick that you feel like you are inhaling them. It’s terrible.

Well, it’s also raining tourists. They are everywhere. You know tourist season has arrived when the outer edge of the Walmart parking lot is full of RVs. I don’t understand why tourists come to Alaska and camp overnight in the Walmart parking lot. All Walmart parking lots look the same. People! Go camp in the wilderness located five minutes up the road. You won’t experience the great Alaskan adventure in the Walmart parking lot.

• They are slow fliers.

Mosquitoes are slow fliers. A butterfly would beat a mosquito in a race. Particularly if the mosquito is weighed down by a tummy full of your blood.

Tourists are also slow moving. First of all, many of them are driving huge motorhomes. The interstate highway system in Alaska only has four highways which cover 1,082.22 miles. Swarms of tourists in motorhomes hover over all 1,082.22 miles of the highway system. Bumper to bumper. It takes twice as long to get anywhere in the summer.

• They buzz.

My husband goes nuts when a mosquito buzzes around his ear. The irritating buzzing sound that disturbs my husband comes from the mosquito’s wings which beat 300-600 times per second. This, in turn, bothers me when I wake up from a sound sleep to the earthquake effect caused by my husband jumping around on the bed trying to annihilate a mosquito on the ceiling.

There is also a peculiar buzzing sound that surrounds tourists. Whenever there is a swarm of tourists, there is noise. Especially when wildlife is involved. “Look a bear, a moose, a sheep, an eagle, a mosquito!” Yes, the tourists’ mouths run just about as fast as a mosquito’s wings.

And the questions that drone on and on. Do you live in igloos? Where are the polar bears? What time do the northern lights appear? Do you know the “Bush People” from TV? Why are there so many mosquitoes?

• They only last for a season.

The worst part of mosquito season runs from the middle of June to the end of July. That’s when they are the most active. But once the colder weather hits, the mosquitoes are gone.

July is the busiest month during tourist season. There will be sightings of tourists before and after July, but the most massive swarm hits in July. But again, the cold weather hits, and poof – the tourists disappear. Only people that really love us come to visit when there is snow on the ground.

The truth is tourists are vital to Alaska’s economy. Almost 2 million tourists visit Alaska every year, and on an average, each tourist spends about $1,000 in Alaska.

As Alaskans, we love to show people our uniquely beautiful state. Looking at Alaska through a tourist’s eyes is refreshing. Sometimes as locals, we take for granted the rugged beauty that surrounds us. God did some of his best work when he created Alaska.

However, I’m not sure what He was thinking when he created the mosquito.