Cold, Muddy Pigs

I've begged for an all-day excursion for weeks, but our schedule is so often tied up with sports.  We chose sports and we love sports.  What's not to love about this?

 But we were ready for an adventure that took longer than a couple hours.  We decided to go to Hanalei for the day, but that went out the window when the night before, we were so chilly neither of us wanted to get the remote because it meant getting out from under our blankets on the couch.  Instead, we went for a hike in the canyon after Zachary's early game.

It was 50 degrees, windy, and misty, and that meant we were freezing.  We had to take some "before" shots because we could see it was going to be a muddy day.

 Moving gets you warm.

 Kate called this discovery an "ice cream flower."

 She was a trooper and hiked 4 miles, "because I'm almost 4."  Zac pointed out the injustice of the situation, since the hike was 7.5 miles and he is only 7.25 years old.

 This hike has been closed down for the last few years, and we completely forgot about the waterfalls and how well it opens up along the coast.  We almost decided to stop here but it's lucky we forged ahead--it was getting late and we worried about hiking in the dark with the kids, but pushing forward gave us the views below.

 Blowing on his hands to keep warm:

 The wind was seriously nuts.

 I think this picture is so cute,

 ...but this picture screams "Zachary":

"Mom!  You should have put my hair in a pony!!!"

 Love this shot.  We saw a whale breach (well, I did) right as we geared up to take this.  It's crazy you can see something like that so far up in the cliffs.

 Kate is WAY TOO BIG for this.  Brady carried her for a long time.  This is that awkward transition stage when they are too heavy to heft around but too little to make it long distance.

Early on in the hike, I jumped out of my skin when I looked up at this little piggy strung up in the trees.  Ew.  The kids and Brady laughed and laughed and we talked about it the whole way down.  We also told the kids all about hiking this same trail with Zac when he was really little, and how a huge pig charged at us down a hill.  We were very nervous, grabbed sticks, and started yelling at the pig and he decided to stop charging us.  He was about 100 pounds or more.  With that story in mind and the dead pig in the trees, we were all on the lookout for pigs.  This one turned out to be our only sighting.

We usually make up stories on hikes, but this time we made up songs.  I have to include them because while they are ridiculously simple, they also are the stuff of memories.

Zac and Me made up a chant and Zachary thought the echo sections were the best.

Muddy, Muddy, Muddy, Muddy (Echo: Muddy!)
Repeat.
Mud in my toes and mud in my nose,
Mud on my bum and mud is on my thumb.
I said it's muddy!  (Echo: MUDDY!)
Repeat.

Kate and Dad sang theirs to the tune of "I Like to Eat, Eat, Eat Apples and Bananas":

I like to hike, hike, hike through the trees
With the mud, mud, mud all over my knees.
I like to see, see, see pigs chargin at me.
And feel their eyes, eyes, eyes staring at me.

 We got out of there just before it started getting dark, and of course had to take a muddy "after" shot. This doesn't feature Kate's very muddy bum and actually most of the mud washed off, so...not a terribly impressive picture, huh?  It scratched an adventure itch for our family, though, and reaffirmed our belief that hiking is one of the most wholesome things we can do with our kids.  It's a lot of work, a lot of clean-up, and sometimes even a lot of whining, but in the end we are all happy and refreshed.