Let's go hiking she said

So, at some point this summer, my daughter & I had the, "I want to start hiking."  "OMG! I've been wanting to start hiking too." conversation.  I immediately went to Pinterest, pinned a bunch of pretty pictures, thought about buying hiking boots and pretty much put the thought out of my head.  But Sarah.... Sarah has decided she wants to hike the entire Appalachian Trail.  "Not right now, but sometime," she says.

Sarah keeps begging me to go with her to day-hike up the Blue Ridge Mountains and I keep putting her off.  It's too hot, it's too rainy, there'll be too many tourists....  Not to mention that what a normal hiker would consider a 'day hike' will probably take our slow, out of shape butts three days to hike.  Okay, my out of shape butt.  And when I say "hike" I mean trudge up hill, gasping for breath & tripping over tree roots.   And have I ever mentioned how Sarah goes into hysterics if there's any sort of flying insect within 300 yards of her?

Maymont

So today, we went to Maymont to practice hiking.  I love Maymont.  It's really just a huge, hilly park with animals where moms push baby carriages and kids run up & down the hills.  But there are hills.  Some of the hills are pretty steep & I figured it was a good place to go prove how out of shape we are.  Okay, okay - how out of shape I am.

Maymont's friendliest goat

We saw some goats.

These goats have a sliding board to play on.

And the bear.

Maymont's Bear

By the way, I finished my Autumn in Alta poncho last night.  The yarn I used is the exact color of this bear.  In fact, I sort of look like a big, giant bear in the poncho.  But that's a whole other story.

Owl

We saw this beautiful owl.

Bald Eagle

And this bald eagle doing his Exorcist imitation.

Buzzards

And of course, buzzards.  Knowing those buzzards were there, just waiting for me to falter on the path kept me going.  Being pecked to death by buzzards at Maymont is not the way I want to leave this world.

Maymont, #RVA

We 'hiked' some more and we climbed the waterfall.

Waterfall

I made Sarah look at the giant fish.  Sarah is weirded out by fish like I am by clowns.

Koi Pond

I have to admit, the giant overgrown goldfish are a little frightening.  Beautiful, but even I have to admit, a three foot long goldfish is a little bit intimidating.

Maymont

And we trudged along a few more paths, stumbling over tree roots.  Or maybe that was just me.

Geese at Maymont

And we saw some geese.  You know I'm a sucker for taking pictures of geese.

And as they say, revenge is a bitch.  Since I terrified Sarah by making her walk past the koi pond, she made me hike up a crazy steep hill on a tiny, narrow, muddy path that looked more like a goat path than a path meant for humans.

Maymont

Here we are at the top, looking back down.

So tonight, Sarah is talking about hitting a real mountain trail next week while I'm hoping my boss is reading this so he'll understand when I call out of work tomorrow because I'm too stiff & sore to put on the uniform.  It's a damn good thing Sarah isn't wanting to do the Appalachian Trail right now.