Cougar Mountain

Now that the end of the year rush is over and school is out I've been wanting to squeeze in some hiking before the baby comes. Unfortunately, at 36 weeks I feel like I should try to exercise some caution and not try to go trampling all over the wilderness. So, this week we opted for an urbanish hike, not too far off a major interstate.

Not wanting to end up carrying Seth too far, I packed along an entire bag of jelly beans to provide the proper motivation for hiking. I also opted not to bring the backpack carrier (if I don't have it, it's not an option . . . although this line of thinking has been known to backfire at times). I don't know if it was due mostly to peer pressure, the jelly bean trail, a steady supply of walking sticks, or lots of slugs to look at along the path, but Seth was an all-star hiker. We probably hiked almost three miles and I only carried him on my shoulders for about a third of a mile total, mostly because his pace was killing me.

I've found that my kids do better with "destination" type hikes. So my challenge was to pick a destination amongst several in a park that I had never visited with miles of trails. Thank goodness for endless hiking and hiking-with-kids type blogs! I settled on a waterfall as our destination. While overall it ended up being a good choice, it would have been a little better if I have actually brought a change of clothes for Seth on the hike and not left it in the car. Next time!

A few iPhone pictures from the trail and falls . . .