Over the River and Through the Woods

In high school, my church youth group would take a group of us camping and called it Wilderness. I was talked into going a couple times by my now husband. It's a pretty rustic area - you don't have to pay to stay in the campground, but there are only pit toilets and a river.

My husband goes there a lot when he's hunting, but it's probably been about 6 years or so since I've been there. We took the boys there this weekend.

Here's Malachi enjoying himself in the icy-cold glacier water. I was not so keen to go wading in it (I remember washing my hair in that frigid water back in the day... and it's not so pleasant), but I did get far enough in to snap a couple pretty pictures of the landscape.  The boys are hanging out in the tent and then there is the lovely picture of Malachi and the coyote. He and my husband went "bear hunting" and came back with a coyote. Apparently Malachi spotted it and he was so excited (can you tell from the look on his face in this picture??). I guess I have a natural born hunter on my hands.

We also did some hiking. The original hike we were looking for was VERY hard. WAY harder than I expected. The site I found it on said "good for kids" which was a total lie. See that narrow little path in the second picture on the bottom? That was where we stopped and turned around. I didn't take that picture at an angle - that's how steep it was. Holding a 25lb person on your back doesn't help you when you need all your balance. Malachi was terrified he was going to fall down the mountain.

We did find another remote trail that we walked down for awhile and that was fun. We found some good views and some insects that Malachi enjoyed chasing. I love the picture of Shaun and Malachi looking out at the mountains. =) Zachary can only handle so much hiking though... then he decides to scream the rest of the way - which is not so fun for the rest of us.

All in all a fun trip! This will probably be our last camping trip of the summer, but I'm still hoping to get in some more hiking in late-Summer and Fall. I just love the time outdoors with our family. Good memory-makers!