Sunday, November 30, 2014

Day 29: Teach them to hike while they are young.





We just got back from an afternoon of hiking and rambling around the hulking cliffs that surround Bear Track Lake.  It’s a challenge to hike with small children, but I think it is well worth the time and trouble to instill a love of nature in them while they are young. 
We’ve been dragging our own kids around on hikes since they were babies.  We carried Hannah into the bowels of the earth (at Mammoth Cave), when she was only six months old. 
Now she has kids, and they’ve both been spelunking.  One is three months old; the other is three years old. 
Our afternoon hike sounds like a pretty minor expedition compared to some taken by one of my heroes, Mary Jane Butters. 
Mary Jane lives in Idaho, and she’s written several books that focus on living an organic life “farm-girl style.” 

She has written about the time she carried her daughter (about two years old) more than 50 miles on a backpacking trip.
She'd probably laugh at our short hike, but we enjoyed the time exploring and just being outside.  

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