High Shoals Falls

A middle of the week day off of work + Four very active, but tired of swimming every single day, kids = A day trip to the mountains where it's 10 degrees cooler.

And, the decision to head to the mountains happened at about 9:00 am, followed by a flurry to pack lunches and water bottles and get directions because there is no cell reception for GPS, and we were out the door by 10:00 am.

Team Peeler for the win.

It was a short one hour and 20 minute drive to South Mountains State Park, and a wonderfully full afternoon of hiking and swimming and mountain adventuring.

The trail was only 2.7 miles, but because my kids climb every rock, hang from every tree, and jump every boulder, they probably walked 7.2 miles. No such thing as staying on the trail, conserving energy, or walking quietly and taking in the beauty around us. 

As we were walking up to the falls, three deer dashed across the path in front of us. It was the last thing we expected to see - quite literally they ran right in front of us.

Because my kids are stealth-like, they yelled amongst themselves to chase the deer and clambered the hillside to see if they could find them.

I'll taper your suspense: they never caught sight of the deer again.

After a long and sweaty hike up to the falls and back down, we stopped by the river to play. Getting feet wet turned to getting legs wet turned to taking shirts off and fully swimming. Cool, clear mountain water... very refreshing!

School may have started a couple of weeks ago but we are finding plenty of ways to keep on playing and enjoying summer!