Throwback Thursday: Hiking

I've spent down time today looking up hiking trails in Oman.  I've found a few good websites.  This site is a wiki site of many hiking trails.  It's so many, I'm a little intimidated.  This site is a blogger's first hand experience and tips that a friend sent to me.  And this site is put out by Oman's tourism ministry, and it shows trails and details difficulty, whether they're marked, highlights, picture spots, etc.  I plan on printing the 3 maps they provide so I can mark off on my own which ones we've visited.

All this research has me super excited about hiking here.  Our family loves to hike.  Yes, sometimes the boys get cranky near the end of the hike.  We usually try to plan something fun and cooling like ice cream or sno cones for the end of a hike as a reward, especially if they were good and didn't complain (or at least not too much or unreasonably).

I'm also reminiscing about our past hikes as a family.

While in Duncan, we tried to hit every trail that the kids could handle in the Wichita Mountains.  Stephen's parents joined us for many of these hikes whenever they would come to visit.  Some would be surprisingly cold, some would be warmer than expected, some involved large wildlife (longhorn cattle and bison).

The boys from a hike in the Wichita Mountains with Mamaw and Papaw.

I'm also thinking about a more unique hike:  when we hiked the Waimea Canyon in Kauai.  We hiked the Cliff and Canyon Trails, I believe.  It was May 2016, so I had a 4 and 6 year old.  We started out with two kids and four adults.  About a mile into the hike, my mom decided to turn back.  It was rather steep at times on muddy/dirt/tree root paths.  The rest of us trekked on.

Waimea Canyon - my favorite picture of a farther off waterfall.

Going out, it was very foggy whenever we'd get to an opening where we could see the canyon.  Basically, we couldn't see the canyon.  All we could see was a wall of clouds.  Very cool and eerie all at the same time.  It was also at these openings that I started worrying about my young kids.  Even though the path was wide, it was still a cliff edge.

Coming back, the fog cleared so we could see for miles and miles.  The scenery was gorgeous!

View of the canyon from a waterfall.  The fog has lifted!

In the end, we did about 5 miles round trip.  This was way, way, way too much for short little 4 and 6 year old legs.  I think Stephen ended up carrying J part of the way back.  It was basically a moment of "Yes, I know you're tired.  Yes, you have a right to be tired.  If I carry you because you weigh not even 30 pounds and wear myself out, will you ride along quietly?  Ok, hop on."

The reduced visibility with the fog.

My munchkins hiking with Grandpa and Stephen in one of the wider open areas.

We finally got back to my mom and the cars.  I captured the cutest pictures of J grumpy and ecstatic taken just a few seconds apart.  After leaving the canyon, we headed to JoJo's Shaved Ice for a treat.  Oh yum!

"Sad" J

Happy J... side note:  he still wears this shirt and shorts

Our reward of shaved ice.  No, I didn't eat it all.  I think we got 2 or 3 to split between 6 of us.

Great, now I'm hungry...