The Hike

 Last year a friend posted pictures from Rickett's Glen State Park and I decided that I needed to go there. The children decided that they needed to go to Dan and Laurie's house this summer so when we figured out that the two were close together it became a combined trip. 

Dan and Laurie met us at the park and we did the Falls Trail. The Falls Trail itself is a little more than 3 miles What I did not realize is that we would have to walk a mile plus to the trail and a mile plus back to the parking lot. It became a long hike! But 17 falls in 3 miles was worth it!

    

The first half of the trail was all downhill. It was over a thousand feet that we descended. Anna needed to hold my hand to go down that uneven stone steps. It was pretty neat to start at the top of each fall and end up at the bottom looking up at it.

 About halfway, where the two creeks merged, we stopped for lunch. The children could not wait to take their shoes off and walk in the water and explore. It was about then that I realized the second half would be all uphill.

We found a letterbox!

 

 

And then Isaiah started getting tired. He would sit down wherever he thought was a good spot and took off his shoes. At this moment I had told him to count to 30...he said 120. He started counting...at 60 he told me he was halfway and at 110 he put his shoes on. At 120 he was up and ready to go a few more steps.

Jeremy chewed on birch branches because they taste like root beer. Josiah and Aliza tried it too. Nothing quite like walking with the guy that has leaves hanging out of his mouth!

After the stops got quite frequent, Dan put Isaiah on his shoulders. Isaiah rode for a few minutes and then was ready to walk. I think Isaiah got 3 rides to get him through to the end.

Anna got pretty miserable during the last 2 miles. Conversation distracted her and kept her moving.

Isaiah also lost a tooth in the second half of the hike. He wanted to eat an apple and his loose tooth was bothering him so he asked his Daddy to pull it. That's the second tooth Jeremy has taken out for Isaiah.

This was a beautiful hike. It was the longest and hardest hike we've done as a family so far. It was worth the effort though! 

We stopped at the closest ice cream joint and then the children promptly fell asleep for the hour and a half drive to Dan and Laurie's house.