Since it was mid-afternoon when we arrived we decided to play in the river first. It is a shallow river with a mild current that is lots of fun to walk down. It is pretty slippery so you have to be careful. I have come close to falling more times than I can count in this river while holding a little one. I chose to stay on the bank with Dryden this time instead of slipping and sliding downstream. Brent and the rest of the kids braved the rapids!
What good big sisters! They kept close watch on Camden and even helped him follow after them.
Dryden and I sat on the bank in the shade and looked at the water. Then we moved a little closer and put our feet in. Eventually Dryden was lying on my lap splashing in the water. Finally I just stripped him down and put him in. He had the best time splashing. It was adorable!
He is SO chunky!! He responds just as quickly to either name--Dryden or Chunky. :)
Off we go on the hike of a lifetime! Some would say that we are crazy to hike with 5 kids, and some times we would agree!!! No, seriously, we love to spend our time outdoors, and the children love it as well. We have some of our best family memories on these outings, and you will quickly see why! We saved our hike for later in the day when it wouldn't be quite so hot. We started out around 5:30 (I think) and it was quite the dilemma of whether we should hike first or eat first. The kids were all for eating first, but I knew that if we ate first we wouldn't have any time at all for hiking. We had brought tin foil dinners to cook over the coals, and I know how long that takes! So, much to the kids' dismay we (the parents) decided to hike first.
This hike called for a water crossing only about 1/4 of a mile into the hike. Now, generally when we take a hike that indicates that there is a water crossing, there is some way to somewhat conveniently get across the afore mentioned water crossing--a bridge, a log, a trail of rocks...something of the sort...Well, not this one!! This was a true water crossing in every sense of the word. The girls were told to let Dad go first and find the best route. The rocks are very slimy and slippery and there is a current here. Well, as you can see, they didn't exactly listen. They did let Dad go first, but they were close on his heels. They also didn't take my advice and tie their shoes together and sling them around their necks. They thought they would save some time and just carry one shoe in either hand. Can you guess what happened? Sure enough before they had even made it half way across they both went down. Allison was hilarious because she had her arms out to balance herself and she would teeter one way and one shoe would go in the water and then after she had recovered, she would teeter the other way and that shoe would get soaked. Standing comfortable and dry on the bank, I found this quite amusing. Braden wouldn't have anything to do with crossing the water so Brent carried him over on his back. Camden wouldn't have anything to do with being carried over the water. I carried his shoes and he walked beside me, but he made it all the way across all by himself. His shorts got wet, but he made it!
This is VERY GRUMPY Savanna. Savanna isn't grumpy very often, but watch out when she is. It is sCArY! She was really upset that she got her socks and shoes wet and that she was going to be hiking in those soaking wet socks and shoes. Her pants were pretty wet as well. And, because she was testing out her prowess of teenage attitude her shoes fell into the river twice while she was putting them on, and Brent had to jump in to save them!
Mr. Camden here made it to the other bank with dry shoes. Well, that didn't last long. Not five minutes after I had dried off his feet and gotten his nice dry socks and shoes on him, he was fooling around and fell right into the river!
Braden is such a ham. I don't know what this face was about. He was the only child that ended up with dry shoes on the hike. He probably made this face when he realized that we would have to recross that same river on the way back!
Allison was a good sport about the whole water crossing. Her shoes and pants got soaking wet, but she didn't let that dampen her spirits. The only thing that did sour her attitude a little was when dad made a slight navigational error on the return hike that added 1/2 a mile to the trip. She wasn't too pleased about that! But she had dried out in time for the second water crossing!
I love this picture of the kids and Brent together. Savanna's face here is priceless since she was under duress to smile!
Dryden is a wonderful hiker! He loves to be outside and just takes everything in until he just can't stay awake another minute.
Savanna eventually turned her frown upside down and smiled the rest of the hike. Everyone loved carrying the camelback. That was a big hit!
This is the classic Braden "I just can't make it any more" pose. It was mostly an act, though. He didn't complain at all, and he didn't ask to be carried--thankfully--he is way too big for that!
Here we have Camden in his classic stance. We have intake and output all at the same time! Camden was quite the trooper. On our 3.5 mile hike he hiked along at quite a good little pace for his little legs. The spigot of the camel back never left his mouth unless he needed to speak. Towards the end of the hike he and I were at the back of the pack, and I said that we needed to run to catch up and his response was "I can walk, but I'm too tired to run!" And it was true. He never complained about the hike or walking. He will do great at Big Bend next month!!
By the time we made it back to the river crossing everyone was pretty worn out. The girls and I decided that we weren't going to take our shoes off at all this time. We would just live with soggy feet for the last 1/4 of a mile until we got back to the car. It was so much easier!! You wouldn't believe how sharp those rocks are on bare feet, especially when you are carrying a little chunk on your back! Camden had decided that he wanted to be carried across this time, and we thought that that was Braden's intention too, but when I looked back at him he was standing out on a rock with one shoe on and one shoe off. Needless to say he just walked across the river with Brent's help after that.
By the time we got back to the van and dried off it was after 8:00. We (the parents once again) decided that it was too late to try and cook out over a fire. By the time we would even be close to ready to head for home it would be at least 10, and that was way to late for everyone. So we decided we would just stop at Sonic on the way home. Brent probably won't ever do that again. It was $25 to feed the kids just a snack, and I didn't even order anything for myself! Brent was outraged by the price. Next time we will probably stay and cook out no matter what time it is!!! It was a wonderful afternoon and we all had fun laughing together--well, most of us!
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