Saturday, September 1, 2012

Dragon's Tooth

 We have been wanting to hike to Dragon's Tooth in Salem as a family for a year now, ever since Chris and I went last summer for our anniversary.  Labor Day weekend seemed like the perfect time to go so we packed up the baby, the dog, and everyone else and headed up to the trailhead.
 Seth is wearing the onsie that I designed for him that says "Mom's hiking buddy." We are ready to hike 2.7 miles to the top.
 At first the trail isn't too bad, just forest and a few rocks every now and then.
 Then the trail gets a little more rocky, which the kids thought was a lot of fun.
 Then we came to this...yes, this is actually the trail.  You have to climb up the rock face to get to the next part of the trail and there were several places like this.  Some places had bars sticking out of them like ladders to help and others were more like this.  All the groups we passed were amazed at how well the kids were doing on the rocks. 
 This stair stepper rock seemed like a perfect place for a picture of all the kids and since Seth was asleep in the Moby wrap, Mom too.
 The first view, and there would be several more. 
 "Hey, when are we going to get to this thing you keep calling Dragon's Tooth?"
 Diesel didn't scramble over the rocks quite as easily as the kids.  People kept commenting about how I was taking the baby up this trail, but I think Chris had the tougher job.  At 70 lbs, Diesel is no lightweight, but we wanted to bring him as he is getting older and we aren't sure how many more hikes he will be able to take.
 Finally at the top.  This is on top of the tooth, you can actually see a 360 degree view from up here.  The kids did great, they never complained once and had smiles the whole way.  They all made it without any help too.
 Our second time up to Dragon's Tooth.
 The whole family.
 After spending some time climbing on all the rocks and playing in the sand at the top, we headed back down.  Down was easy for everyone but Diesel.
When we got to the creek, Diesel gave up and laid down in it with a look on his face that said, "Just leave me here and I'll die in this nice cool water."  After a rest, we made him get back up and finish the race with the rest of the family.  We all made it the whole 5.4 miles and really enjoyed this time together.  We also know that the memories will last.

3 comments:

Sarah said...

you are so adventureous! or maybe the rest of us are just wimps...
looks like a great time

Jo said...

Great Job Guys!

swedishsmiths said...

Way to go! I agree, Diesel looked much heavier than Seth. :-) My kids love that hike. We need to go again just to get another family picture up there. I love the picture we have, but the kids are starting to hate it because they look "too young."