Five Miler

NS still had to do his hiking/backpacking snack for his cooking merit badge.  We've had the ingredients for a while, but finally got around to it.  He's closing in on getting his merit badge finished up, so it's just like, get it done!  I checked the trail map.  I chose the path to take.  I told everyone what we were doing, and that it was a five miler.  No one listened. Most were somewhat unprepared for the length of the hike.  Oh well.  No one died, so it was a success anyway.  

As we started the hike, this is the flower that caught my eye.  Pink lady slippers are common in the forest around our campground, but I only saw a cluster as we started the trail.  Quite beautiful, and I'm glad I got to see it since there weren't a lot of them hanging out.                                      

Here the creek is quite large, or alternatively, this is one small river.  There were places where the water was quite slow moving, but in other places, there were mini rapids.  We hiked most of the time following this creek.  The day was noticeably cooler when we were near the creek.  I chose to NOT follow the creek at the end, and it was a hot part of the trail.  Oh well.                

Along the trail we found a graveyard.  The graves were from the late 1800s~early 1900s.  A good many of the people died young (2-25), and the oldest was 84.  There wasn't a sign telling us anything about this family, but their last name was Vinson.                  

J and NB drew my attention to the toad and the slug.  This is inside a hollowed out stump.  A good find!                      

It was just such a pretty hike.  Nice and relaxing, despite the heat and the lack of preparation.  We all enjoyed the snack that NS prepared for us, though we decided that we all enjoyed carrying our own snacks instead of having one person in charge of a snack.  I did have G carry his own.  He tends to have blood sugar issues, and I'd rather him eat whenever and however much we wants.  Such a nice day!