For spring break, our friends The Kennedy's invited us to go to Gatlinburg with them. We'd never done a friend vacation before and it was super fun. We got to our cabin (which I have all of zero pictures of) on Wednesday night. Thursday morning we suited up to go on a long 11-mile hike. We didn't think the little girls would make it. We'd kind of tentatively planned for Kip to go up halfway with them and then take them down and come back and get me later. It wasn't a great plan because he would have to come back to pick up the rest of us since there wasn't enough seating in the other cars. Lucky for us, those girls booked it up the mountain. At least at first.
I should say that we underestimated the difficulty of this hike. I mean, 11 miles is long, but it's not like I can't walk 11 miles. I should also say that Kip and I both went at it with kind of this idea that it wasn't a "real" mountain after all because it wasn't one of the Rocky Mountains. No. It was a real mountain.
We had also underestimated the weather. It was spring and we were in Tennessee going on a hike. We wore short sleeves and some of us wore shorts. A couple of us brought jackets (namely me and Mark) and Kip wore long sleeves. But even in the parking lot at the bottom of the mountain we realized our mistake. It was chilly. Still we figured we would warm up as we climbed. Which was very true. But it also got colder the higher up we got. And wetter. Much wetter. There was water running through some of the path like a little stream, melting snow, and regular snow. The Kennedy's had a few extra jackets in their cars, which they put on our kids (sleeves rolled up as high as possible), and Elizabeth had a towel from their car and Savannah had left her bathrobe in our car, which we decided to bring just to be safe even though it might look funny. I was so glad we took all our oversized and hiking-inappropriate warm stuff because we were just so cold at the top. I was really grateful for Savannah's robe and the extra jackets and everything.
The first 2 1/2 miles of the trek, it pretty much seemed like a hike up a decent little hill. It was an enjoyable, not extremely steep climb up a mountain. The 2nd half was much harder. I still have a hard time believing that it was--mile-wise--a half (and it might have been a bit longer, but not much). It took so much longer than the first half. We trekked up much steeper landscape and it got wetter and colder. We hit water and snow. Some parts were a little dangerous (as in a kid could have tumbled to his or her death if they weren't careful), but the kids (and the grown-ups) were all very careful and I was proud of how the kids respected the danger and were appropriately cautious without being afraid.
The trek down was somewhat easier, but by then we were tired. Also, I consider the downward hikes hard on the knees. I don't know if that's true for everybody or just me, but by the end my knees were done (probably before the end to be honest, but I had to get to the bottom somehow--no one was willing to carry me). It started to rain the last mile or two and I was so grateful we'd started in the morning like we did.
By the end we were all exhausted and wet, but I think pretty happy at the accomplishment. I was anyway and the kids seemed to be too. I love hiking with my kids and I thought it was pretty fun and satisfying to do something hard like this with them. Also, I'm so glad we did it with the Kennedys because their kids are mostly older and I think it inspired my kids to have these big kids as examples.
Here's Elizabeth at the first cave we hit.
Kip and Savannah.
Elizabeth (with that towel on her shoulders):
Emma the movie star ("Oh, I'm so shy; please don't photograph me in my big movie star glasses).
Mark. I was glad to see I had a picture of Mark because he and I were often at different points in the hike (with him being well ahead of his mother).
Savannah:
Savannah with our good friend (and my co-writer) Jake. Savannah just adores Jake.
At the top, there was this little lodge thing where you could go to the bathroom, eat lunch, and buy cookies and hot chocolate. I didn't think I would buy either, but I was starving even after eating my lunch, so those cookies looked pretty good and I started shivering partway through my meal. I ended up getting a hot chocolate too. Here are a bunch of the kids warming their hands over the heating thing at the lodge.
Savannah with Kip at the top of the mountain. It was WINDY.
The family--me with my eyes half-closed because why take a good picture at the top of the mountain?
The view from the top.
Here's the snow. Our shoes were soaked by the end. Kip carried Emma a LOT of the way down. He carried Savannah a bit too.
Savannah and I:
This might look like a little spring stream, but it was our path--the path we walked through.
Kip and Emma (Emma's wearing my hoodie)
Jake with Savannah. I was so glad they were climbing buddies for a lot of the hike because Savannah was super talkative and pleasant with Jake, but whenever she hiked with me, she started to complain.
My friend (and biking buddy) Holly who also came along for the ride.
Scenery. I'm not sure I appreciated it as much as I should have, but it was beautiful.
At the end we were all pooped and starving. In fact, interestingly, I was starving most of the next day too and a little bit the day after that. i don't think I was really hungry, but I feel like my body was like, "If you're going to put me through that again, you need to feed me."
On Friday we went to the aquarium in Gatlinburg. It was pretty fun, though I got no cool pictures. Kip did, but I don't have his phone right now. We saw sharks, sawfish, penguins. It was fun. My only complaint is that we were done in just over an hour and it was expeeeeensive. I'm glad we went though.
After that, we drove home. This is Emma's typical long drive look. I'm not sure why she does this, but it comforts her in some way and helps her fall asleep. It's always funny to look back and see her covered in blanket.
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