Day 8 – Ups and Downs

Narration here.
The campground had several hiking options, one of the most popular was a 3.5 mile round trip to see an Indian Rock house. The trail head was at the top of the hill so this position would hopefully allow some brief connectivity to check emails and update the blog. Theresa made bacon and eggs for a pre-hike breakfast using the grill and a griddle, Thanks Ron and Tracy.. This saved not only heat inside but also the potential for the smoke alarm blasting as it normally does when Theresa is cooking bacon inside.

The Toad was loaded up with dog and all electronics and hiking paraphernalia that would be needed to accomplish all missions. Theresa chose to just use tennis shoes as her blisters were just healing from her >6 mile b-day hike a few days ago. Kevin put on his boots, hat, water fanny pack and grabbed his walking stick. Theresa had the dog on leash and headed to the trail head only to see a sign prohibiting dogs! Argh! None of the documentation warned that dogs were not permitted! There was no choice but to return to the RV and leave Zin to rest up in the AC during our hike. Theresa thought she heard a big sign of relief from Zin as she closed the door to the RV :)

Up the hill again to the trail head and the trek was finally started just around high noon. It was a steady shaded descent on dirt and gravel trail at the start, which was fairly easy in relation to the b-day hike and terrain. The trail map marked several notable features along the journey to the turnaround point of the Rock house.

The first featured stop was the Sinkhole Ice box which was just a big hole, some hikers braved to take a closer look but not these!

Next was a trickle of a waterfall that was quite cool in temp and esthetics. Surrounding that where very interesting rock cliffs that jutted out and rose 3-4 stories above the trail. Around the corner from that was an abandoned Zinc Mine. Continuing on the trail the hikers crossed an area where the rock had been smoothly carved by various water flows over the years so it was christened the Sculptured Bedrock. Just down from that was the massive Indian Rockhouse. Complete with caves, stalactites and an exposed underground stream. This required a bit of exploration and many photo opps.

It was a slow hike back up to the trail head towards the parking area but shorter in distance that the scenic trail route out. Part of the hike back was behind a younger group of hikers that included some very sunburn youth as well as one girl in flip-flops(amazing!). Kevin and Theresa continued back up the trail as that group stopped to play in the Natural Bathtub.

Once the hikers were back to the Toad, Theresa got the laptop and Mifi from the car and sat with Kevin on a picnic table in the shade to try to edit and upload pictures from the previous day for the blog post. With just 2 bars on the Verizon mifi, picture uploads were failing so they would need to limited to just 1 or 2 for the post. Kiehl had sent another Mr Opinion Podcast as well, which took 30 min to download as the sweaty hikers longed for an iced beverage.

Frustration with the internet speeds, and heat, soon won out so everything was loaded back in the car and the two headed back into the off-grid zone.

The river seemed to be a good way to cool off and Kevin was still wanting to do a Drone flyover off its shores. Kevin performed the drone set up procedures and had Theresa do the guidance system dance until the device was flight ready. To reduce a sand storm on the beach, Kevin had Theresa held the drone up over her head then release it when it started to rise. The flight was short and sweet yet caught the attention of the other beach goers in the area. See Kevin's video.

With a successful flight completed Kevin and Theresa coaxed Zin to get wet up to her belly. Zin quickly retreated to the shore once the rippling river tickled her tail.

The water was jacuzzi temp but still pleasant after the heat of the hike. Kevin walked upstream for a bit just so he could let the current carry him back downstream like a floating stick. That was fun! He videoed the event on his Go-Pro.

Time for shower and dinner then bed in prep for an early exit in the AM.