Spring Break

The first week of April was Sam's spring break from school. We didn't have any vacations planned and Paul didn't take any time off work, but I wanted to do some fun things with the boys. I had great intentions, unfortunately they petered out after Monday.
On Monday, Robin and I decided to take the boys to the zoo. We got there within an hour or so of the zoo opening. Apparently everyone else in Greenville shared our grand idea. It was a zoo (heheheh)!! People everywhere. The parking lot looked like we had arrived at an amusement park instead of our measly zoo. I didn't take many pictures, but I love these of Sam and Max.
After Monday, I don't even recall how we spent the rest of our spring break except that on the following Saturday we took a family hiking trip. Some of my most favorites memories from childhood are all the times we went hiking in the mountains, even the time when my older brother, probably no more than 5 years old at the time, managed to go missing. I was too young to be too bothered by his disappearance; I just passed the time that he was missing by chatting it up with some fellow hikers about some bird we had at the time and Sesame Street. But, back to the present... I thought it would be great fun to take a picnic up to Chimney Rock. Well, we dined in at Chick-Fil-A instead, but we did make it on a couple of different hikes at Chimney Rock. The boys did impressively well. So long as he had a hiking stick (this became a MUST as soon as he saw someone pass by us with one), Nathanael was a real trooper.
The main attraction of our first hike was a waterfall. The trail was very crowded. They are currently doing some construction at Chimney Rock, so the main trail is actually closed, so every visitor was on the same trail. It kinda detracted a bit from the back-to-nature feel and seemed more, again like the zoo, like an amusement park. It was a nice hike and the waterfall was pretty, nevertheless. Plus the weather was magnificent.
They also had a trail for children with a bunch of stops along the way where the kids could learn cool things about different woodland creatures. There were lots of cool sculptures and a few interactive things. Best of all, it was a leisurely stroll (the boys were a bit worn out at this point) and only a few other people were going through.
Spring break was a good test run for what summer is going to be like. I better get started coming up with creative activities or I'm afraid we are going to drive each other nuts!