Extreme Mom Bravery

It is very important that I mention the extreme reserves of bravery that Dr Mom had to call upon. I had intended for us to to do a two mile, easy loop through temperate forests - the upper and lower Waimano Trail loop - but we didn't take the correct turn to the left to make the loop, and went incorrectly ahead onto the much longer and more difficult Waimano Ridge Trail. (To be fair, the hike books said that the turn was marked with a sign, we sure as heck couldn't see, and one of the books helpfully told us it was marked by two mango trees, two stumps, and a rock....which didn't help much either.)

Anyway, the Waimano Ridge Trail turned out to be about 80% easy with a couple of really hard bits. We strolled along the ridge path, which was quite flat and mostly wide enough to walk with ease. Then we met a small family coming the other way who said we were heading to a place where you had to use a rope to get along the trail. Since our guide book for the loop hike said we would need to "traverse the canyon wall" we thought, at this point, that we were still doing the loop hike. When we actually got to the place with the rope, we started to have our doubts. Hubby will post pictures of the spot in question. Suffice it to say that Dr Mom had to steel herself to hold onto a rope, reach down to a bunch of slippery roots from a high rock, and balance along the edge of the wall clinging to the rope, all over a pretty sheer drop. Of course Deep Thought managed it with no problem, and Little Starlet only needed a bit more encouragement because of having shorter legs. But Hubby was full of praise for Dr Mom for not giving up.

A few hundred feet further on, we met another rope dangling over a bunch of rocks above a narrow ledge. Gosh, we thought, and this walk is meant to be good for beginners? At this point I think we concluded that we were on the wrong trail. Dr Mom got down that one by sitting on a rock in a puddle. Coming back the other way was easier: We all scaled the rocks like goats, and even the precipitous rope-over-drop experience wasn't quite so bad (though both Little Starlet and Dr Mom needed a bit of a boost from Hubby, or our little, unathletic legs might not have made the step up).

Didn't we all feel triumphant at the end of that one!