My friend Jenn is in town, and whenever she's around, she makes me want to go out and do a thing! We've hiked Red Rocks, gone up to a mountain lake, and this time, we went to Castlewood Canyon!
I tried to convince all my boys to come with me and give Jessi a break, but in the end, I could only convince one!
Echo was such an adventurous little guy yesterday! We leapt over rocks, running off of the trail to find them, and shout "shortcut!" as we took routes that were obviously NOT shortcuts.
At one point, Echo said, "Dad! Shortcut!" and pointed to what was just a drop-off right into the canyon, and I replied, "That's not a shortcut, that's a death trap!" Which, because this boy is VERY like his dad, became the new game! He'd point at paths that led to sheer cliffs and shout "shortcut!" and I'd say, "Noooo! That's the deathliest death trap that's ever trapped!"
At one death trap point, we saw a waterfall pretty far off. (We had no idea where we were actually going.) And Echo was so excited, he said, "Dad! Let's go to that waterfall!" And so, we decided heck with it, it was waterfall-hunting time!
We followed the directions of other hikers, followed the path, followed our gut sense of direction, and before long, we made it to a little stream! We found a crawdad in the stream, which made me a little nostalgic, because my brothers and I used to let the crawdads nip at our feet when I was a kid! It's probably been half my life since I'd been here, but I still remember it! (Which also means I remember crying because I didn't want crawdads to nip my toes.)
The path was a overgrown and crowded, so Echo and I took off our shoes and walked down the stream, trying to follow the sand so we wouldn't slip on the rocks, but occasionally I would lift him over a boulder, and he would say, "I'm floating!" as I did it. 💗 He's such a sweet and adventurous and brave guy! Which was tough when we got to the edge of the waterfall, because he wanted to hang out RIGHT BY THE EDGE!
And then came THE PHOTO OP. We all played a game that Echo created, which was that Echo would find big rocks, give each of them a big rock, and then we'd throw them off the waterfall! I was able to sneak away while Jenn and Edwin entertained the rascal, and I climbed barefoot across a steep slope, holding onto roots and skidding down rocks, until I found a place where I could set up my tripod. I set my phone in it, connected it to bluetooth, and then climbed barefoot again back up the rocks and roots and clicked my bluetooth clicker to get the amazing picture above!!! All four of us at the top of the waterfall!
And then I climbed barefoot all over again to get my phone and tripod and climbed barefoot back over again to rejoin my peeps! Echo did such a good job, and he had a wonderful time in Castlewood Canyon, collecting acorns and finding shortcuts and death traps.
And then came his wonderful reward! Back on July 11th, we all dashed out the door to get our free Slurpees, but when we got there, the Slurpee machine broke down! Which meant all my children broke down! This is all important to say, because yesterday, when we got to the 7-11 so Echo could collect his bribe, the attendant had been told to give Slurpees away for free, because it was so hot out!!!!
So in the end, Echo got his free Slurpee! I proved to myself that I am in good shape because I hiked a long way with a bag full of supplies and with a kid on my back for a lot of the way, and I feel like such a good dad for taking Echo, a good husband for insisting I take at least one kid, and a good friend for going on an adventure with a college friend.
Which makes it a really really good day in my book!
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