OK -- some of these titles are a real stretch, but, we try...

On our last day of vacation, we fought the fog once again to follow the
Upper Shamokin Falls Trail to the beautiful falls and a couple of boxes!
Once again, we were anxious to see the changes the rains had made since
everything was virtually dried up from the drought during our visit last
summer. Sure enough -- we could hear the falls from much farther up the
path.

We tried to keep the kids to a slow sprint as they clambered down the
sloping trail plied with slipper rocks. How to explain that if they run,
slip and fall they may just crack their little heads open on all those rocks
without dampening their enthusiasm?! The tightrope we parents walk every
day!

Mud was quickly covering the stain on my sneakers from where Miss Ma had
tumbled her s'more the night before. They had clammored for s'mores only to
ask the helpers at the campfire to please hold the graham cracker and the
marshmallow! OK -- I like a good chunk of Hershey as much as (if not more
than) the next guy but having it melted between the carbon coated mallow and
the graham just exponentially yummifies the whole experience. Well, their
requests came in too late and Mom was reduced to attempting to pull off at
least one graham cracker and sucking the marshmallow off of the chocolate
(the sacrifices I make!!). I finally got them clean down to the chocolate
when Be decided he didn't want it anymore (Da got that one) and Madeleine
dropped her now open-faced s'more right on my nice white Keds...

Whoops -- I digress! Back to the trail. Be and Ma were skeddaddling down
ahead (I believe that is the official mountain term) and Da and I were
trying to figure out how we were going to airvack them out bleeding and
concussed to the nearest hospital ("I believe that was a helipad site we
almost drove off of in the fog the night before, darling"...) when we got to
the box site. Be launched himself up toward the tree trunk only slip (we
knew it would happen) and land on his thumb. No blood or brains leaking out
all over the forest but we'll be darned if you couldn't tell by the
hollering going on!! After about ten minutes of thumb examination, the
application of a very cold water bottle and promises of a glow-in-the-dark
Sponge Bob Squarepants band aid upon our return, Mom scrambled up the slope
and retrieved the box. Be was still too damaged to stamp in but the rest of
us did.

Feeling very cocky and having fully recovered from injury, Ma and Be once
again sprinted down the rocky trail (you'd have thought they would be going
a little slower now, wouldn'tcha? But Noooooo)

We got down to the falls and enjoyed the sight. There are lots of big rocks
to sit upon to rest and wonder. Da even found a crawfish which Na quickly
poked with a twig to stop its escape under a nearby rock. The poor crawfish
curled up into a paralyzed ball of fear and proceeded to lay there in a
catatonic state while Na and Da cooed over the splendor of the earth's
creatures (or something like that) Of course, important scientific data on
the crawfish was not listed in any of the three guide books we had purchased
that morning in the nature center (we realize it's not a bird or a butterfly
but if it is not a backyard bug like thing, what is it? We must have missed
the laminated guide on small mud inhabiting creatures that taste really good
heaped next to a side of gumbo (ooooeeee-- them's good eatin!!)

We followed the directions and stood on a big rock (looking quite majestic,
I assure you) but had no luck finding the monkey! We poked, prodded and
searched but nothing. The area was plagued with gopher holes (or holes made
by something) but we would be darned if we were going to stick our little
hands down any of those suckers when our new three foot long pokey stick
disappeared down one such burrow! We even brought out our flashlight much
to the amazement of the other families sunning on the rocks. They must have
thought we had lost a wedding ring the way we were pouring over every nook
and cranny of those falls! Oh well! Disappointed, we headed back up the
trail (which somehow seemed to have gotten a lot steeperand wetter in the
meantime...) slipping and sliding on the rocks once again. From there we
headed to the bungee trampolines which somehow seemed a little less scary...
BeMa
P8F108

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