Second Pine Mountain Hike -- Just the Three of Us

With our previous hiking successes, I braved the Pine Mountain trail by myself with both kids.  I wasn't sure what to expect, but we had a marvelous time.  I was amazed and grateful for our magical day.  This time, Elijah begged to start at the beginning of the trail so our first stop was to buy maps and talk to a ranger to get directions.  Elijah was super excited with all the signs that proved that we were starting at the beginning.  He was also enthusiastic about his new Pine Mountain Kids Map.  Elijah insisted that I take a bunch of pictures of the signs including the sign for The Gardens Overlooks, which turned out to be our destination. 

As we did on our first Pine Mountain adventure, we found a snack rock to rest, eat a few munchies and take some pictures.  In some of the photos, you can see that Keira's trademark smile was missing.  In many ways, Keira is a sturdy little girl.  She rarely cries when she falls.  In fact, she even fell onto an ant hill a few months ago and got bit about eight times.  Without even blinking an eye, she calmly brushed off the ants.  Yet, her sturdiness does not extend to loud noises and most bugs.  Unfortunately, on our second Pine Mountain hike, someone was using their saw for the entire duration of our hike.  She was not a fan.  Although, you can see that she felt a little better sitting with me.  She spent the hike cuddled into the sling sometimes covering her ears and generally trying to block out the saw.

Elijah, on the other hand, had a great time on the hike and was generally happy and smiling.  Although, by the end of the hike, he'd had quite enough of posing for pictures. 

As you can see from this last picture, we hiked 1.3 miles on the trail, then we had to hike 1.3 miles back to our car.  As, Elijah told our server at dinner, we hiked two and a half  and one tenth miles (otherwise known as 2.6 miles).   :)