Camelback Mountain, New Year's Eve, part 1

so, one of our favorite things to do on new year's eve (which of course, we like to do at grandma w's house) is climb a mountain (remember). unfortunately, this year hil & nesto's family couldn't join us because they were sick, but we still had a fun time, and a great hike! i was so impressed with the girls!

here we are at the trailhead, we had about a 1/2 mile walk just to get here...

 

a view about half way to the first major saddle. it always amazes me to remember how far you can see in az, and especially how far when you climb a little for the view!

 

sometimes you nees a little rest. (if i remember right, we were nearly to the first saddle here), we debated turning back at that saddle because the rest of the way looked pretty hard, lots of big boulders to clambor over, so paul and i were talking and the girls were resting, and all of the sudden we turned around, and the girls had started on up without us :), so we quickly started after them, and i was truely impressed with how they finished the climb! i think most of the 12-15 yr olds i know would have whined a lot more, and probably moved slower too!

 

there was this little palo verde tree that the girls particularly liked, it only took us about 3 minutes to realize that it was freezing up there too!

 

so we grabbed our sweatshirts and then posed at the highest rock we could find!

 

just to give you a little idea of the hike back down, it never looks as big in photos as it is in person, the first saddle i was talking about is the one down in front.

the trail was just over 1.5 miles long, with a 1330 ft. elevation climb

 

if it helps put things in perspective, that blue dot up behind rayna is a person.

 

and just to let everyone know, malachi was there too... though he wasn't too happy about it! poor boy was cold and tired and didn't mind being on daddy's back (or mom's, i helped a bit too), but he did NOT like the idea of 'hiking' on the hike at all.

 

and really, the main reason we love hiking as part of our new year's eve traditions, is because it really tuckers everyone out! we get great naps, and then we're good to stay up really, really late!

 (see next post to realize that's like 10 pm...)