Father's Day Hike

Ok, so I'm a little behind in my postings. I have been super busy and quite honestly pretty tired too. Since some time has passed I am not sure how thrilling or interesting my hiking story will be, but here goes anyway.

For Father's Day, after the breakfast that Caiden and I made for Dave, we decided to take him on a hike to the Santa Margarita river trail. It was a hot day (as all of them have been lately) reaching temperatures well over 100 degrees, so we lathered the sun screen on the kids and ourselves and off we went.


Not sure if you can see, but Caiden's shirt says "little guy" and Dave's says "Big Guy"

Kiya in the pack ready to go :)

I should mention that earlier that morning, Dave had presented Caiden with two very essential things for hiking. "Magic" hiking shoes (Dave told Caiden that these were very special magic shoes that would allow him to walk further distances than the previous hikes - funny thing is he believed it and was able to go much further than our previous adventures...tells you the strength of mind over matter). The other gift was a walking stick. Now Caiden had picked a stick out on the last hike, but promptly threw it back as he stated he wanted a very straight stick...no bends or curves. Dave took him to Lowe's where he picked out his perfect straight stick. Dave then wrapped it with some grip tape and some kind of medical tube that they use on patients and Caiden now has his perfect walking stick to go with his magic hiking shoes.

Caidn in his magic hiking shoes and walking stick

Now I will preface this story by adding that there is a very specific point in this story that pictures will be unavailable. When I get to that point, you will know why. Anyway, we loaded the kids (furry and human) up in the truck and off we went.

The view along our trail...

It was a REALLY hot day, and our deal with Caiden is that when he wants a break we will sit down and take a break. He did very well, I think we only took 3 breaks. We walked by a little stream that became a river crossing. I prefer to walk by water, and the dogs REALLY enjoyed it. Frankly, it was so hot I think that they would not have been able to carry on unless we had the water to go into. We stopped for a spell at the water, and Hunter wasted no time jumping in and swimming. Flash did a little swimming, but mostly held to the shore. Hunter swam his little heart out. It was hard to get him to stop. They were having so much fun we hiked a little further on up the river and then then stopped for lunch.

This was on our first break
Me with the dogs and Caiden
Hunter walking out to the deep end so he can swim
Hunter and Flash (we met other dogs too)

The stop by the river was actually quite serene. There were lots of dragonflies, the sound of the water was really soothing, and the feel of it on our feet was refreshing. If it weren't so hot I would have stayed longer.

Me and Kiya (if you look into my sunglasses you can see me taking the picture) :p
Kiya in her pretty hat...well, you still need to look adorable while hiking

My adorable little man, Caiden :)
The best picture of a dragonfly we could get.

After lunch we were feeling pretty good, and the dogs were bounding down the the trail as they had been refreshed from the water, so we felt good enough to plug on. At this point we had already been hiking for a few hours, so we weren't sure how much further to go because we had to hike it back out with Caiden. We saw a sign that said river crossing further up and then their was a viewpoint. We hiked to the viewpoint and then thought we would try to cross the river. This is where the pictures will end. Sadly, you will see (well rather read) why. First off, let me say that for some reason or another my balance has been a bit off. Secondly, I am inherently klutzy to begin with. Third, as we were hiking, I was thinking to myself about what I would say in this blog posting, and was filled with joy that I could tell Wendy that I am not ALWAYS bad luck and that I had successfully made it through an adventure without drama. Of course, I was hiking in a forest so there was actually a lot of wood that I could have knocked on, but I didn't actually SAY my thoughts out loud so I thought I would be safe. NOPE!!!

Dave, Kiya, Caiden and Hunter (they are looking for fish - there are huge ones in the river)

So here we are. Let me paint the picture for you. Dave is carrying Kiya in the backpack, he crosses the river holding Caiden, while I cross with all of our shoes, the dog's leashes (which are the retractable ones so I could put them around my neck or anything - they are awkward), the pack I had around my waste that had water and food, and my phone and camera. Mind you I DID say that I was carrying our shoes. Now this was Dave's bright idea. In all my years hiking, I have NEVER and I do stress NEVER crossed water without my shoes, but Dave did not want to be squishy the rest of the hike, so he insisted that we take off our shoes.

This is the part that I wish I had pictures, so I don't sound like such a reject. The water was high - hence Dave carrying Caiden across it. The rocks were few and far between, and they were a bit pointy. The rocks in the water were covered with algae which is extremely slippery. Dave crosses fine. I am halfway across and I am fine, until I notice I had dropped a dog leash. I am at the point where there are two rocks that are reasonably close together. I am straddling the pointy rocks, and trying to bend down to pick up the fallen dog leash when...that's right. I lose my balance and plunge into the water...WITH my camera (but I managed to save my phone!!!!). I am so PISSED at this point, and Dave is yelling orders. He comes across to grab the camera (which has been completely submerged in water and is dripping wet). I then make it across the rest of the river. I am so angry at this point because my camera is now dead, and Dave is telling me why I fell (even though he did not see it). I am now grumpy and frustrated which added to the heat and some choice words that Dave had said, I had HAD it!

At this point, we turn to go home. But wait! We have to cross that darned river again. Now I am afraid. I pack the camera and phone with Dave in the baby carrier. He carries Kiya and Caiden across, and I try to manage with the other crap. I nearly made it, until I hit those two rocks again (the SAME two rocks - I think they have it out for me. I swear I heard them laughing). This time though I managed to slip on the underwater rock with all the algae and plunge into the water hitting my right angle (where the bone is) and pushing the underwater rock into the right side of my back. (Darn you Wendy! I ALMOST had an uneventful blog entry). I am now completely drenched and in a lot of pain, which just ticked me off even more. To make matters worse, I had dropped the front of Dave's shoe in the water - remember he didn't want to be squishy.

I finished making it across, but my clothes are sopping wet, and I am in a very foul mood. Did I mention that my toes and feet were cut to crap because of the rocks in the water? Remember, DAVE wanted us to take our shoes off to cross. Hindsight I should have listened to my gut. Anyway, to make a long story longer, we made it out. A little worse for wear, but out. Funny enough, Dave looks at me as we are hiking out and says. "Give me the camera I want to take a picture of where you feel and then you can write on the blog RIP Camera". I just looked at him - remember I'm not in the mood. He then remembered that we cannot take pictures because I killed the camera.

Because I am so obsessive about pictures we went straight to Best Buy where thankfully I had purchased the accidentally insurance on my camera, so they swapped it out for free. I strongly encourage klutzy people everywhere to buy that insurance. It was only $30 and it was hassle free.

The rest of the day didn't go much better as we stopped off to grab some food for us and water for the dogs, where Dave nearly got into an altercation with some very trashy people which resulted in my running outside with both kids in tow to calm down the situation.

Sigh...all and all though, the hike was good. Lessons were learned, and I would be game to go again and redeem myself. Of course, I will make Dave carry the camera next time. :)