Memorial Day Hike

So I'm working a little backwards right now. I have a lot to catch up on but wanted to get our Memorial Day hike done. We'll talk Germany (tomorrow). We had a great day on Monday. We set out for a 4 mile hike. 2 miles up and 2 miles down. Specifications: No whining. No I can't walk anymore--please carry me and no quitting. IF we all adhered to these, on the drive home we would stop and get a milkshake of our choice. Mine being peanut butter and Dave and Sam's being chocolate, banana. So above is Dave and Sam at the trail head. You're not going to believe it but we quite possibly were the only ones who spoke english. And that's saying a lot as I'm quite certain a vast majority of the Seattle area, I would even venture to say the whole of Western Washington chose to hike Rattlesnake ridge that very Memorial Monday. Yes, there we were right in the midst of the United Nations. Fascinating as it was Wendy claimed the very same argument. She and her family hiked Little Si. 

Please play Sam's video next. We think we have the next Ken Burns living right under our roof.  

This is his first documentary:

As you can see we had a beautiful day. We've had beautiful days the last couple weeks. But it's near June and Seattle has something against the sun shining in the gemini month. Or as I like to regard it as the month that homes the most celebrated of all holiday's---Flag day. So we bask in the sun's glory in May and must wait until nearly August for us to see the brightest star shine. This is why we vacation July at the ranch or Maryland. We need our vitamin D. 

The hike in and of itself was really a lot of fun. Sam was fabulous (most of the time). We had one mishap and I'm not sure if anyone knows this but if you get an injury (scratch) like this: 

one must scream like you are lying at deaths door. Can you just imagine the blood? No?

Well if you did you have a very good imagination because there was none. However, Sam's screaming was not imaginary. From his agonizingly loud whaling we were thinking we would have to amputate. Fortunately for all parties involved a boy of about 6-7 years of age walked by and the injured one (Sam) had to put on a brave face. He was then back to challenging his poor osteoarthritic mother to race---uphill to dad. BECAUSE Dave, when he hikes has 2 points in mind. That's it. That being point A (point of departure) point B (point of destination) and how fast will it take to get to each point. I should have remembered this from our honeymoon. There is no journey, no stopping to smell the roses, no tip toeing through the tulips. And believe me it is no easy task keeping up with those legs of his. I think next time I'll weigh his pack down with bricks. Hopefully that will slow him down. But we persevered and it payed off. 

We had a great lunch up at the top and Dave and Sam crawled down in some of the crevices. I'm not going to lie. The Viola Davis blood runs thick in my body. It doesn't look daunting from the picture of Sam and I but it was a bit scary for me. Not only because well my balance is not the greatest but there are tons of cliffs up there and scraggly rocks. Sam is a wild man he could have easily fallen to his death. I was a nervous wreck. I had to close my eyes so Dave and Sam could explore. I just sat, didn't move and waited upon their return. 

We enjoyed coming down even better--though I'm not sure my shins did. 

Sam however was anxious to touch sea level again because he was a goal oriented boy that day. He was going to fish. We had bought a cheap fishing pole at Target. Well I had. Unfortunately in my eagerness to make a quick purchase I didn't see that that certain Transformer fishing pole didn't have a hook. Luckily for us as we were down at the lake we found a hook tangled with some old fishing twine and Sam set out to catch dinner for us. But alas once again it was not meant to be. I WILL make sure that boy catches a fish this summer if it's the last thing I do. Here he is casting. I think he'll give Jason a run for his money on his "form".

This is Rattlesnake ridge from the bottom. We climbed to the peak shown. It took us about 2 hours to get to the top--that included the journey, smelling the roses and tip toeing through the tulips. About an hour to get down. There was no whaling or nashing of teeth (except of course for the incidental trip--but Dave and I were forgiving of that) so we stopped in Falls City and bought us a $4 dollar milkshake. It went down pretty good.