Backpacking trip!

In mid-July, Elvin took the kids on a backpacking trip to an area called Goat Rocks.  It's about a 3 hour drive into a national forest and supposedly inhabited by mountain goats along its mountain peaks.

We went with a some of the kids' friends and another dad.

It was a longer hike than the kids were used to and at a higher elevation too.

The scenery was very pretty and we had to cross little creeks every so often.

We wore headsets because there were lots of mosquitos and they were hungry!

In the prior weeks, Elvin encouraged the kids to exercise in order to get in shape.  Eliana listened to him but the others not so much.

We had left later in the day than we had planned and so also were trying to get to the campsite, about five miles in, before sundown!

We did arrive in time.  And the sunset was very serene and beautiful.

It was a rather cool night, in the 40's but the sleeping bags did their job.  Gabe slept in a tent with Karina and Elvin slept in another tent with Eliana.  It used to be that all four used to share a 3-person tent, but that doesn't anymore because everyone is bigger now!

It was a beautiful morning!

We set out to climb further up into the mountain, this time without the packs, thankfully!

We wanted to get to the peaks above the timberline, to see if we could spot some goats.

We reached Goat Lake and did see some goats, where were tiny white spots far off in the distance that moved every once in a while.  We were so high up that the lake and its surrounding area was still covered in snow and ice.

The boys enjoyed throwing rocks into the lake.

We had lunch up at the lake.  Everything tastes better on the mountain!

Back at camp, Gabe also liked exploring the little creek nearby which was also our source of drinking water.

Dinner is served!  The one bad thing about this site was that there was no good place to sit!

For breakfast the next day, it was eggs, bacon, cheese and english muffins!

And we were ready to head out!  The kids declared that the hike down happened much more quickly than the high up.

Here is a little video that Elvin made of the trip.

On the drive back, everyone was hungry.  We stopped at a diner that had humungous portions, which was good because everyone had humongous appetites to match!