Hocking Hills, part 2

The morning of day 2 we started out by getting ready. It was chilly (in the mid 40s) and rainy, so the girls wore sweatshirts under their raincoats. But I wasn't too worried about them being under layered. If they were anything like me, they would heat up as they walked. This picture was taken from the porch/deck off the cottage floor. The girls, Grace especially, liked swinging on this swing.

Here we are at the beginning of our hike, as we departed from the Visitor's Center and descended into the gorges that were cut by the river. As with most parks systems, the trail was equal parts "natural" and man-made--with steps and bridges and pathways created to make the trails easy for lots of tourism.

You can see here that I am now the one toting Hannah on my back, as opposed to the previous day's walk. I was looking forward to carrying her, but I'll admit wondering if it was a wise decision once we started up and down the trails and I wondered whether the person with the worst balance should be loaded off center with another person. But I managed to avoid catastrophe.

This is known as, I believe anyway, Lower Falls. (Yes, it did remind me--in name at least--of a similarly named set of falls in the beloved DeSoto Falls camp grounds of my youth.) But this one was much easier to get to and is pretty nice. The arched bridge above it is certainly attractive. And after we got some pictures taken with the falls behind us (which is not sported on my iPhone wallpaper), we hiked up the trail a bit to see the falls from above.


And here we have our young, intrepid hikers. To say that Lynda and I were proud of them is to damn with faint praise. (Am I using that Shakespeare right? I'm never sure on this one.) They were fabulous during the hike and walked and climbed with nary a complaint and full of excitement and appreciation for everything they saw. It was a wonderful experience, made even more important by the fact that this was our only opportunity to hike for the rest of our trip. Once we came home for lunch, the rain strengthened and we weren't able to make it back to the other places we'd intended to visit. So, we played board games and drew and I read as much as I could get away with.

It was a great experience for sure. It makes me wonder, honestly, why we haven't tried to get over there more often. It is so close and a day trip to a park is free. I hope we make the time to do it again, soon . . . when the weather cooperates more.