Hiking, Llamas, and a Ditch to Explore

Nate and I woke up early one Saturday in June, picked up a niece to babysit, and hiked Adams Canyon. Hiking just the two of us was delightful, and we got up early enough to beat the heat. The only downside was that somehow we ended up right behind some enormous cheerleading group, so we had to wait several times for them to move along. It was nice to enjoy each others' company, be able to chat without interruptions, and to be on a destination-oriented hike.

That same day, we went to see one of Nate's coworkers who is pretty recently retired. He invited us over to see his llamas. The kids were in heaven. They got to feed them and pet them and chase them around. This visit somehow morphed into a soon-to-come vacation! So stay tuned for that.

We are really enjoying being so close to the mountain. Great hiking is five minutes from our front door. One evening we drove up to the trailhead and decided to hike briskly for about fifteen minutes and then turn around and come back, just to get some blood pumping, ya know? It was fabulous! We ended up in a beautiful place by a bridge where the bank of the stream was covered in blooming wild roses!

Also close to our house is a very wooded walking/biking/running trail that we've gone to several times. There's a little stream that runs through it that I've really wanted to explore with the kids. So as a family we went and found a semi-decent spot to get to the water and we waded and got our clothes all wet and had a lot of fun. There were these two huge metal pipes with water running through just the bottom of them that the kids decided were water slides. The big kids especially thought it was the best! The current was just a little too fast for the little guys to feel totally confident. We have since found another place where the water's slower that I feel like I could go by myself with the kids for an afternoon of exploration. It reminds me of the long afternoons I spent as a kid exploring the woods in Georgia, and Nate of his childhood desert explorations. Take that, suburbia!

 A snakeskin! Eeek!