Hiking!?!

You will NOT believe what we did today.  WE can hardly believe what we did today. Let me start at the beginning.

Erik had the day off from work today, but our plan had originally been for the boys and I to head to a friend's apartment complex to swim in the pool and hang out.  The early afternoon weather was not cooperating.  The other mom and I spoke around 12:30, and it became clear that we would need to reschedule.  Luke especially was VERY disappointed.  It took him the better part of an hour to recover during which I formulated a plan.

We all got in the van and headed to the ultra benign fireworks stand about six blocks from our house.  The boys had never visited a fireworks stand before.  They liked it.  We didn't buy a ton of stuff, but everyone got to pick a few small things.  After the fireworks stand, we hit a drive-thru Starbucks and headed for the carwash.  Yes, the carwash.  They love it, and Erik's company pays for it because it's the car their rep drives around.  They want it to be clean.

After the carwash, we headed for a park that is more like a Nature Preserve with the intention of allowing the boys to run around on the trails.  It was closed.  Boo.  We grabbed our smart phones and rerouted to a different "nature-y" destination, REALLY hoping it would be open!

Powell Butte Nature Park was a hit (Luke's exact words!).  We parked the van, got out and were immediately greeted by a stunning view that included Mount Hood, Mount St. Helen's, and Mount Adams.  Beautiful.  I'll let the pictures tell the rest of the story.

 In the visitor's area there are all these different gages of pipe filled in with cement.  The boys spent a few minutes playing on them.

Think of these as the before pictures. :-)

 Paul sits on the largest one.

We started up a paved path, purely with the intent of exploring a bit. Erik had a map.  We knew the boys wanted to get to the forest-y part.  But first we had to hike through this simply stunning, daisy-filled meadow surrounded by views of mountains.  It was gorgeous.  And I got the boys to pose for this picture.

After about forty five minutes of walking, some uphill, but mostly flat, seeing many cool insects and "tracking a coyote" we FINALLY made it to the forest.  And it did not disappoint.  The boys were completely enthralled with the environment.  They walked ahead, found cool stuff and reported back to us.  We even convinced them to walk silently like Hobbits at one point so we could all listen to the forest sounds.  So cool.

 A very cool snail that we spotted.

 Paul just really wanted me to take a picture of the forest.  Here it is.

We probably spent a half hour walking downhill into the forest.  And all I could think was, "What goes down, must go up again...guh...how is this going to end?"  Sure enough the next half hour was spent walking up out of the forest, back to the top of the butte.

When we reached the top of the butte, we still had about a forty five minute walk to where we parked the van.  Okay.  My people have NEVER hiked before.  Guess what?  They did fine.  Yes, Paul was tired but only mildly whiny for the last half hour.  He didn't cry.  He didn't quit.  Nobody carried him.  He and I just trucked along talking about all the water we would drink when we got back to the van.  Because, yes, we headed out on our explore leaving our water bottles in the car.  I don't think we really knew what we were doing.  I know we didn't.

 This is about fifteen minutes from the end and we all just had to stop and admire the view again.

 Mount Hood peeking through the clouds.

After over two hours of hiking, we arrived back to the parking lot.  And this is what the boys did:

Those are the after pictures.  They were definitely tired, but also completely thrilled with the experience.  We drove straight to Subway where Luke ate his very first footlong sandwich.  And a bag of chips.  And a cookie.

All in all, we had an absolute blast and will most definitely be returning to Powell Butte.  We brought home the map and our plan is to park in an area that is by the forest and hike ALL of those trails this summer.  Anyone else surprised at the addition of this activity to the Bangsund repertoire?  Um...I am!  But they loved it.  And it was beautiful and mostly relaxing and awesome.  AND that was on a day when we weren't REALLY prepared for hiking.  Next time we'll have water bottles and shoes with toes!  It will be epic.