Father's Day Hike...

Happy Father's Day!!!

To celebrate this special day, we went to early morning Mass and then headed off to a state park for a hike. We had never been to this particular park, but had read some great reviews online and my photographer brother especially wanted to get some shots of the waterfall that made it famous.  I made some barbecue pepperoni pizza, my brother made chocolate chip cookies, and my mom brought salt and vinegar potato chips for our lunch, as we figured (correctly) we'd be pretty hungry after the hike.

The waterfall was absolutely breathtaking, not to mention beautiful! Too bad we don't have one of these on our land...it would be amazing for swimming!

I had only gotten about three hours of sleep the night before and my brother said I looked grumpy in all his photos...
this is the least grumpy looking one...

After we left the waterfall, we started down the hiking trail.  At first it was relaxing and peaceful; we passed several streams, a Yorkie puppy, and another (man-made this time) waterfall...

...theeeennnn we figured out that our map wasn't very reliable, "steep incline" meant cliffs, and the path abruptly ended at a rushing stream with a fallen log being the only way to cross without getting soaked.  After crossing the stream and climbing two more cliffs, we ran into another hiker who was just as lost as we were but was pretty sure we were on the trail that was on the opposite side of the park we were supposed to be on.  Luckily we had brought water and we were in the shade the whole time, so besides not knowing where we were, it was actually quite lovely.

We finally found a path that we were reasonably certain was made by humans and not deer, and followed it until we ended up back in civilization.  We were too tired and hot to have a picnic like we originally planned, so we sat in the car and enjoyed the air conditioning while we feasted.

 After we got back home, we all took LOOONNNNGGG cold showers and settled down to watch a movie.  Everyone had a fun time, and personally I would love to go back soon...more prepared for wilderness survival.