When the alarm clock went off this morning I could have killed whoever had the idea that we should go on a hike and then I realized it had been my idea. Argh! So I rolled over and told Robb it was time to get up and get ready to go, went and jumped in the shower to let the hot water wake me up. When I got out of the shower I was feeling much more chipper and ready to go. I belive I was actually excited about the day.
I had gone in to wake up Olyvia before my shower telling her that we needed to get up and get ready. She asked if she could just have a few more minutes of sleep. I told her she could sleep while I showered but would then need to get up. Turned out she didn't even need that long and was up and ready to get dressed by the time I got out of the shower.
We were off on our most recent adventure at 7:40am. As we were driving to meet up with the rest of the family at Starbucks Robb and I were stunned over the fact that we were actually all packed up, kids dressed, us dressed and out the door before 8am on a weekend. It was amazing.
We met up with the family, got some coffee, rolls, and the like. Grandma asked us if we had brought long pants for Olyvia since she was in shorts. I said that I hadn't because the weather had been so nice (80s) the day before that I didn't think we would need them. Funny when I now think about it because I had thought to bring everything else. I had spare clothes for them both, rain coats, sweatshirts, extra shoes, and their blankets and babies. Pants though - nope! She insisted that we head over to Walmart and pick up a pair of sweats or something for her to have "just in case". It is a good thing we did.
Now on the road, the girls will not stop talking, asking a million questions a minute and not even waiting for answers. We finally had to turn on some music so that they would just listen to that for awhile and give our heads a rest and that didn't even work. They were so excited they could barely contain themselves. We were thinking that they would fall asleep on the ride up but that didn't happen.
After a call to the Quilcene Ranger station and determining that access to the trailhead via Palo Alto road was still possible we headed up the mountain. We followed the pavement for about 10 minutes before turning off onto the gravel road. The road was recently graveled in places but there were other places that had a steady washboard going that was slightly unnerving as it would send the truck's back end sliding out ever so slightly. Luckily we were going slow so it was never dangerous, but it sure got my stomach going a couple times especially since one side of the road was a ravine we could not see the bottom of. The girls thought it was great though. They especially liked when I unrolled my window and stuck my arm out to try and touch the trees as we passed them. Olyvia wanted to try but her arms were too short.
Reaching the trailhead at 9:30, unloading the vehicles and getting onto the trailhead at 9:45. The weather was overcast and cloudy, but not really that cold and not raining. About 30 minutes into our hike we could tell that it had started to rain a little, but because we were under the trees it kept us sheltered from the brunt of the wettness. At 1 mile in we passed over the first footbridge. The girls did much better on this foot bridge then they had on the others since they figured they had done these before. I believe Olyvia even said "No problem, I got it." Once on the other side they went right down to the river and Ellie put her hand in the water. This worked as an awesome distraction as just prior to the bridge she had broken down crying because she wanted to be carried like cousin Leilah and I had told her no, that she was a big girl and could make it on her own. Grandma of course buckeled under the preassure eventually and did carry her some of the way up the river.
The area was beautiful and the river wonderful. I was able to take some great pictures with mom's camera as I didn't have any film in mine. Dad said it reminded him of the old days only instead of going slow because I was complaining, I was going slow because I was taking pictures. We both agreed that this was a much better option :)
Another 1.4 miles past the footbridge and we came to a stop. As I had read and been told, the footbridge was out having split in two from excessive force from the river on a rotting log. There was a rope that was strung between the two pieces to help people across, but it was decided that this would be to dangerous to traverse with the kids and instead we decided to find a dry spot under the trees to have our lunch, as the rain had started to come down quite a bit harder at this point.
After an awesome lunch we packed up. We happened to have two garbage sacks between the all of us and we used them to cover the girls up so that they wouldn't get quite as wet as their raincoats that we brought were still in the truck. I won't mention who was supposed to grab those because we don't want to put blame on anyone. Grandma then grabbed Ellie and everyone headed down the mountain, Robb, Olyvia and I bringing up the read. Olyvia kept walking slower and slower because she was uncomfotable, wet and did not want the plastic bag on her anymore. I tried to explain to her that without the plastic bag she would get fully drenched as her father and I were but she didn't want to hear any of it. It was starting to stress me out so I decided to continue down the river and let Robb decide how he wanted to handle it. I believe that it ended up with her still wearing the plastic bag only he just carried her the last mile or so.
I eventually caught up with grandma and we took turns carrying Ellie down the mountain. Once we had the trailhead in sight we made her walk on her own. We got to the truck, stripped the girls and got them in their dry clothes and in the truck with the heater running to warm them up. Robb, papa and Olyvia were not far behind and once they got there we were able to load up, drop Grandma and papa off at their car and head down the mountain.
The hike was awesome even though the rain did put a damper on it on the way down causing us to just want to get out of there and not look at the scenery as much as we had on the way up. We did get to see some deer which was wonderful and the girls thought it was great. There were no accidents other then a minor slippage in the river and some wet feet by Kristin and Darrel. We would really like to do this hike again after they replace the footbridge and we can hike all the way up to Camp Handy.
Our next hike is about a month out. Either Lake Ozette or Mount Elinore on the 28th of September or 5th of October so stay tuned for reports from that.
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