On The Road...to Atlanta

In January we piled everyone into the minivan and headed to Atlanta to celebrate with my good friend Carrie and her husband Rod as they prepared to welcome their first child.  The baby shower was awesome, time spent with old friends was special, and the hiking side trip on the way home was truly a blessing.

As we drove through Chattanooga, Tennessee I was on a mission.  I was driving, had my eye on the prize - being home at a decent hour (i.e. before midnight), I was not interested in a roadside diversion.  Fortunately for all of us, James had an itch to explore and convinced me to find a park he saw on the map.  I pulled off, with no small amount of grumbling, intent on quickly finding this park, stretching our legs for a few minutes, and getting back on the road.  Fifteen minutes and several wrong turns later we found the nearly unmarked road leading to the park.  We parked and loaded a backpack with some snacks, put Ella into a backpack carrier, and started down a trail. 

The sound of rushing water soon swelled from around a bend.  We came around a group of rocks to find and awesome river.

We hiked for a couple of miles, crossing bridges, climbing over rocks, stepping around tree roots, and sometimes pulling ourselves up embankments.  We found walking sticks to do the trail Gandalf-style.  The kids made a game of finding the trail markers and being the leader of our crew.

The trail came to a beautiful waterfall where we sat down and had lunch.  The hike back to the car was a little faster, but just as beautiful.  We met nice people along the way, chatting for a moment or just waving hello.  We got back on the road, tired but exhilarated.  Our jaunt into the woods meant a post-midnight arrival back in Kansas City, but the memories we made were well worth the road weariness and exhaustion.