A little hike...

I was feeling a little blase last week.   I am really enjoying the freedom of summer, but wanted to do something different than swimming at someone's pool or going to the beach.  Both are such worthwhile excursions but Fox doesn't really like swimming yet, and the older girls were secretly (so secret that they didn't even realize it) wanting to do something more.  So I decided we should do some "adventuring".  Normally adventuring entails getting out of the car, taking a 1/4 mile stroll to this little bridge in Penasquitos Canyon, hanging out, then walking back to the car.  Brooke, especially, seemed unimpressed by this plan, so I tried to sweeten the deal with hiking to a waterfall.  Main problem with that was that I didn't really remember how far the hike was.  I went to what I thought was the closest parking area, and we saw on the map that the hike was a little over 2 miles. 

 hmm. 

Should've probably reconsidered at this point.  But I didn't.  So we forged on.  It was the afternoon.  It was hot.  There was really no shade.   For the next hour, I pretty much kept saying, "I think it's just up here guys"  "I think we are getting close".  They were actually pretty good sports, it's just we were going so slow that it took a long time and it's not a particularly scenic hike - at least not the route we took. 

Brooke was even carrying Fox for a large portion of the hike and Ashley had our lunches and a LOT of water. Once we got to the waterfall we actually decided to cross over and try going back on the other side, hoping for some more shade and a little change of scenery.  That's pretty much all you can see of the waterfall - it's kind of a cool little pool.  Going back, we did get some occasional shade, unfortunately, we also added 1/2 mile.. oopsey.  This was where I said more things like, "I'm really sorry, guys, this is farther than I thought." "I apologize, this was a horrible idea." "Just keep going and we will stop and get a small treat."  "Please keep walking and we will stop and get a big treat." "If you keep walking, you can get whatever you want at 7-11".  I think once it was over everyone was pretty proud of themselves, though, and it was definitely an excursion to remember (especially an hour later when the older girls had to head out for their two hour soccer practices)!