Yesterday was a beautiful 75 degree day...so rare for July in the desert. The kids and I decided we had to go on a hike and enjoy the weather. A friend had mentioned Battle Creek Waterfall to me a few days earlier. It's about 15 minutes away and a beginner/intermediate hike. Since we'd gone camping a few weeks before and the kids hiked 1.5 miles (gaining 750 feet in elevation), I knew this would be a snap. It had better be, since we had only one adult-me-going this time.
The hike was beautiful. Easy-ish, with only a few steep parts. The ground was covered in shale at some parts, making the walk a little dangerous because of a long drop to one side of the trail. I was glad I had 2 kids and 2 hands to make sure everyone stayed on the trail.
Eventually we came to the bottom of a beautiful set of waterfalls. The air was cool and there was a lovely little tree to sit on and have our snacks. The kids had fun making dams and playing in the water. The kids are great at seeing "faces" in everything. That tree looked like an old man, this one looked like a duck. One looked like a piggy bank. Abby even made a face with her sunglasses and hat.
We decided to hike up to above the waterfall and were rewarded with this fabulous view of Utah County.
Once we'd had some snacks and water the kids decided they just wanted to see "what was a round that curve in the trail". We did this a few more times, for about 25 more minutes, until the trail dead-ended at the river. You could either ford the river or try your luck on a makeshift driftwood bridge. We opted to turn around and head back down. We'd been hiking for about an hour and knew we had to save some energy for the trip back down.
Shay is a creator. He's a builder. He's a thinker. He's always coming up with things to make or ways to make things better. While we were hiking he kept finding shale rocks that would make perfect arrowheads or spearheads. He filled his pockets with rocks of all shapes and sizes, and even carefully put aside a hatchet-head by the side of the trail to pick up on the way back. He asked me how to make arrows and spears. I told him we could get a library book about it or look it up online. He was serious about making them, and asked me as soon as we got home if we could make them right away.
The finished product of the hatchet turned out rather well. We used some scrap sticks that he's always picking up when we go into the canyon. The sticks sit around the backyard until we find a use for them. We used a stick, his hatchet head, and some strong yarn from the craft pile. Here are the finished products.
Time to go tie-die some shirts from Deseret Industries!
