Posts Tagged: hike

Another interesting hike

We went for a hike down the Close Trail today and really enjoyed a nice chat along the way, and looking under rocks once we got to the water. Sam and Ben ALWAYS love seeing who is living under the rocks. Ben and I will be off doing something (Ben likely up on a rock, saying "Do you want to take a picture of me?!") then we'll hear Sam exclaim loudly "Whoa - ho - ho!" upon a new find. He'll pick up all kinds of crabs, sex them, make a little "habitat" for them (a rock in his hand for them to hide under) and walk around with them. Today he found a big one (not the one pictured above, who had recently expired) and carried it around all over, up on rocks, jumping down, singing a song, lifting it high, then low - finally he said he was giving it a roller coaster ride. They are so much fun to be with! This big guy above got a nice final resting place - Sam put him right at water's edge, front claws nicely positioned, and a nice view of the west where the sun would set. It was so sweet to see him do that. We talked about a huge tree in the middle of the trail - that Lewis and Clark found a HUGE tree 39 ft around. We spread out our arms to see how far around we could get and estimated the total circumference to be about 18 ft. I asked Sam how much bigger Lewis and Clark's tree was and after a minute of thinking he said "Two and one-sixth." I was thinking he'd say about two, or just over two, so I had to catch up a bit. Turns out he did that just right. From there we talked about what that means as a percentage (it's very handy that 1/6 is .16 or 16%). From there we went to the market, starving, which was a complete nightmare because everyone was there stocking up for the holiday. We managed to mess up their system down at the nut/dried fruit/candy bins by inadvertently mixing a pineapple with mango slices and banana chips without noting the little number codes. You really need 4 arms down there to hold the bin open, hold the bag open, scoop, AND keep kid hands out of the bin. We were starving, so it was our own faults we caused such a scene. Once they'd had a snack they were fine - but you should have seen them clawing at the bag of mango slices!!!

In other news, it was time to integrate flocks today, so the six babies got introduced to the big kid house. That meant cleaning and dusting the big house, replenishing food, moving hens over and separating flocks for a bit, getting babies acquainted to new food and water locations, spreading plenty of snacks all around so there’s enough for everyone to peck at (so they don’t pick on each other), and then leave for swimming lessons and a hike so I don’t obsess over every sideways glance the chickens give each other. Still, it weighed on me all day. After all, these little guys were hatched by Jersey and me. I didn’t want them to come to an untimely demise. Tonight they were uncertain about getting in the house – I think Jersey was acting as a bouncer. Merlin really just wanted to hunker down and not think about the cheeping. Lots of cheeping today. At one point I had 6 little hens all tucked into my lap as I comforted them and told them to go in the house. Then they piled on top of each other, climbing all over each other to be the one on the bottom, protected. It was a hen heap. So then I moved them all to the nursery where Jersey had nested, gave them fresh water in the hamster waterer, and put up a concrete block to give them privacy. I stroked their little necks and talked to them. Finally the cheeping calmed down. I think they will be fine – it’s snug where they are and together they’ll generate enough heat. They have food and water handy, and we’ll hope for the best. They’d been weaned off the heat lamp in the garage over the past two weeks and it’s upper 50s at night. The farmer in me says they’ll be totally fine. And so they will. And if they aren’t, well, you can be sure I’ll think it through and try to improve next time. But they had totally outgrown their brooder box in the garage and were starting to fly around in there any time I had to do feed or water. And you already know how those little rascals had messed up their food and water SOOO many times. I was really done with that! They’d soaked the bottom of the cardboard apartments I had made. Time to move on, guys 🙂 Cross fingers with me!

Bloedel Reserve hike

Ben and I had a very nice morning with our new friend Carrie and her son at the Bloedel Reserve, 154 acres of beautiful gardens at the north end of the island. Click for more pictures of our walk.

hot sweaty dirty hikers

Ben is picking himself up from a second pretty good wipe out - he makes funny noises and grunts when he wipes. Then sometimes he just lies there as if completely insulted the ground would move out from under him like that. Check out Tamara's face behind him! We got smoothies at Lanikai Juice afterwards :)

Ben is picking himself up from a second pretty good wipe out - he makes funny noises and grunts when he wipes. Then sometimes he just lies there as if completely insulted the ground would move out from under him like that. Check out Tamara's face behind him! We got smoothies at Lanikai Juice afterwards 🙂

We just went on a local hike today because it was so hot – wanted to make time for smoothies afterwards, and I am pressed for time due to move-related chores on top of the usual routine of work and miscellany. We had a great time, and found a cute orange snail, a spider, and some cool breezes as we neared the top.  Here’s another picture I really like which shows Kailua against the backdrop of the mountains and the marsh.

Kalaheo hillside (my bailout for daytime tsunami warnings).

Kalaheo hillside (my bailout for daytime tsunami warnings).

Sunrise hike – Sam’s birthday opening ceremonies

Sam's idea for a sunrise hike was an excellent one! We all had a great time. Thanks to the moms who helped make this memory!

Sam's birthday is in 10 days. His idea for a sunrise hike was an excellent one! We all had a great time. Thanks to the moms who helped make this memory!

Click for more pictures of the outing. And here is a link to Sam’s bday invite.

Happy hikers!

Some time on the trail with my first hiker buddy. We had a great time together despite the crazy weather! The rain mist kept us cool and our chatter kept our spirits bright. Click picture for more of the family - everyone did it!

Some time on the trail with my first hiker buddy. We had a great time together despite the crazy weather! The rain mist kept us cool and our chatter kept our spirits bright. Click picture for more of the family - everyone did it!

Church, hike, gourmet plate lunch, nap for little boys…

A great day with the whole Fontamillas gang (and a few Rohrers, Krugs and Thomas)...click for the whole story.

A great day with the whole Fontamillas gang (and a few Rohrers, Krugs and Thomas)...click for the whole story.

Holiday hikers

Old Pali Road trail crew...what a great time! Click on picture for the rest of the story!

Old Pali Road trail crew...what a great time! Click on picture for the rest of the story!

We had a great time on the trail today with friends from school. Sam invited Keani and her family and luckily Tamera and her boys decided to come as well! So there were 5 kids age 2 1/2 to 7. Despite some early misgivings about actually going all the way up (any time in the woods is a good time, so we weren’t being goal-oriented about it), the kids all made it to the top of the Lookout! We had a great time and found lots of fun diversions along the way, as if hiking 5 miles roundtrip over 900 ft elevation weren’t adventure enough. I am wondering if the vigilance that I maintain for those 4.5 hours is about like being a cardiac surgeon – do they feel the same sense of profound relief and compelling desire for “fortress of solitude” time that I do after a hike like this? It is a lot of fun, but also a lot of work. I am so glad they all had a great time! You know what is really nuts about me? Should I even share this? I found it relaxing to remind myself about how the Krebs cycle works in my new Biology book that I bought from the thrift store. Sam and I are really excited to dig into the 1200 page book…ok. Maybe I shouldn’t have shared that…

Senator Fong’s Gardens – a tues hiker hui tour

Ben spent most of the hike like this - running out in front with his Meyer lemon, on a mission! He would sniff it, throw it ahead, chase it, pick it up, run for 100 yards and repeat. Every now and then he could be persuaded to stop and smell a white ginger or try a mulberry. We all had a great time in the woods with our guide, Patsy.

Ben spent most of the hike like this - running out in front with his Meyer lemon, on a mission! He would sniff it, throw it ahead, chase it, pick it up, run for 100 yards and repeat. Every now and then he could be persuaded to stop and smell a white ginger or try a mulberry. We all had a great time in the woods with our guide, Patsy.

We have such a great group of intrepid moms of preschoolers! Today five of us went to Senator Fong’s gardens to take a tour of native plants and fruits. We could easily go again and hopefully absorb even more information next time. We are often very busy watching our little ones’ feet so we don’t get to look up as much as we’d like. But we did get to see a chocolate tree and watch our guide Patsy crack open the weird oblong yellow fruit to reveal this sticky, slimy white substance surrounding the cacao seed. We tried a taste of it – very sour and a weird texture. Kinda changes your thoughts about chocolate…a lot of work goes into harvesting the seeds and fermenting them before it remotely resembles a Hershey’s bar. After the hike we came home for me to work a bit while Ben napped, then off to after-school fun (yesterday it was dentist, today flu shots), playground, homework, dinner (the boys just wolfed and wolfed some salmon)…and then Dave found an odd bulge in his VW GTI’s tire. Oh no…hoping against hope it’s not another round of several hundred dollars of repairs. He’ll be taking the truck tomorrow because he has to go in early (like 4 am early) and we can’t have a blow-out happen on his way in. I’ll deal with the car because I can run anywhere we need to go. Cross fingers and toes…

Holiday hike!

Great end to Fall Break - hiking with school buddies. (9 kids under 9!)

Great end to Fall Break - hiking with school buddies. (9 kids under 9!)

after-school hike

A nice after-school hike complete with climbing wall, waterfall, real jungle gym (wild hau tangle), and even a swimsuit photo shoot. Something for everyone!

A nice after-school hike complete with climbing wall, waterfall, real jungle gym (wild hau tangle), and even a swimsuit photo shoot. Something for everyone!

Thought you were interested in the waterfall-waterslide!

Thought you were interested in the waterfall-waterslide!

happy hikers

Mariner's Ridge - Sam 4 1/2 and Ben almost 15 months (asleep!)
Mariner’s Ridge – Sam 4 1/2 and Ben almost 15 months (asleep!)
Sam at 3 yrs old and Ben 6 months gestation (probably sleeping!)
Sam at 3 yrs old and Ben 6 months gestation (probably sleeping!)

I have always loved this picture of me hiking with Sam (and Ben in belly). I thought to ask April to grab a similar picture of the three of us today. We had a great time hiking with our friend, April, and really enjoyed finding another cache. We also loved how the clouds drifted by at the summit, obscuring our view some of the time, then unveiling it softly a few minutes later. I just walked these photos over to Sam so he could see how much bigger he is now. He enjoyed comparing how much he’s grown, and how fast he hiked up this time – only an hour to the top and no snack stop! Wow (for reference it’s 1.5 miles to the top and 800′ elevation gain). I am still impressed he did this at 3 yrs old all by himself! What a guy.

creepy hike

Big hiker boy!
Big hiker boy!

A big bunch of us got together for a hike this morning – I think there were 8 grown-ups (counting an awesome 12 yr old boy!) and 8 kids from 1 yr to 5 years old. So that was a good ratio – about 1:1! We went to Bellows and romped around the ironwoods, then out onto the old runway to take a look at a weird prop that I found a while ago – a huge skull that we think was used for a haunted house maybe? Anyway…we all had a great time. Ben wanted to hike the whole thing! I tried to carry him a few times but he squirmed to get down and keep up with the big kids. What a trooper he is. I tried to measure the distance – it was at least a mile, probably just a hair over. But with all his darting forward then scooting back to pick up a pine cone, who knows! He just really enjoyed himself, then we had snacks under the shelter of the lanai during a shower, then out to the playground, THEN Sam wanted to swim with Aiden…finally wrangled them all home in time to see Dave off to work (he’s still on swings through the weekend and next week). I am tired! Not to mention I’m not sleeping well…there was a mouse in the house a few days ago, which we caught, but I keep hearing things at night just as I’m about to drift off to sleep. Then in the middle of the night I SWEAR I heard something laughing at me – imagine a high-pitched squeaky voice giggling at you? It sounded like the mouse was laughing at me, right on my bedstand. I honestly can’t think of anything that would sound like that at all in the room, so either I am going totally crazy or the mouse did squeak at me. Do they squeak? Do mice climb up things or scoot around on floors? I am hoping it’s just floor scooting, not crawling up walls like geckoes. (Alden, man who knows all, if you’re reading this and you’re about to inform me that they DO crawl up things, please just don’t even comment! Remember, I said I was not sleeping well! In a few weeks you can weigh in on this…)  Then today on the hike there was some teasing – “poopie-head” I think. So I talked to Sam about how we never say that (I don’t think he did, but he thought it was funny when he heard it), but then tonight in the bath it was all poopie water – somehow there were particles floating around! Did Ben do it? I never heard or saw anything come out. So then I’m thinking “GROSS!” poopie water! Ewwww! Flush out tub, rewash everyone in a shower, put in cleaner and let it sit all night, clean all toys…ayy yii yii. I had already had to do two washes of linens yesterday and today because Ben apparently does not like to poop on hikes. He prefers to store up a huge load then poop after his luxurious nap in his bed, then it creeps out of the diaper and he does poop-stamps all over the bed by standing up then flopping down so the stuff comes out in a nice little line of poop-stamp. Ewwwww. What a couple days. I pray for sleep tonight, no huge poops tomorrow, and more laughs. Check the album for the rest of the July pictures. About to upload…

A great hike with a great friend :)

An a'pua'a sneaking up on Ben!
An a’pua’a sneaking up on Ben!

We went hiking with April yesterday on Pu’u Pia – one of our favorites! It was Dave’s first time up that little peak, and Sam was so excited to show him the way. He chatted all the way up and down! We also swung on some vines hanging from a tree and had lunch at P.F. Chang’s in Waikiki with April’s son, Ben. What fun! Love having another A here!

“the next time we hike…

I want you to bring my camp chair so that I have a place to sit on the asphalt that is not too hot so I can eat my snacks.” Can you believe him? I’m just remembering this sentence.

Pu’u Pia hike with Ang

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Ang and I relived old times by hiking with Sam (and Ben) up Pu’u Pia. This is one of Sam’s favorite hikes and we had a great time. It was rainy but we really didn’t get wet due to the dense foliage and the sunshine which chased the clouds away from our little ridge. We also spotted Ang’s husband Josh’s carrier just off the coast, waiting to pull in. We waved, Josh! We also enjoyed a latte on our way to the hike, just like we did when we hiked together in Washington, at Grand Forest (Bainbridge Island) and also Green Mt. It was so good to be on the trail with you again, Ang!!!