Set the night of the 3rd, possibly dawn.
Have you ever actually seen a slough? This narrator has. Her hometown is built over one, it bisects the town. The slough isn't a good place to be and I wouldn't wish it on anyone - except maybe Yellowbelly, but he can't complain. A slough is like a river but it is very narrow and winding; the soil is often very soft and full of silt, so it smells terrible all year, and the water is a murky brown color, totally undrinkable. Its a good place to find ducks and crows because it is a damp environment - but that also means the water is usually tainted with poop. You want to make someone sick? Play in the slough!
The wanderer has never seen the likes of this before, and while he is fresh from the beach it doesn't take long before his senses are overwhelmed by the sulfur-like quality of the air. No salt here - just the odious stench of bog water. He doesn't forget about the beach immediately, but the wolf becomes fixated on finding a clean route south and over the next couple of hours he forgets. As night overwhelms him Yellowbelly finds himself essentially marooned in the middle of the slough; his retention is always worse at night. But when dawn just begins to break, the thin light leads him out of the muck to the south of the disgusting expanse.
He doesn't know how he got there, but thank fate that he did.
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