Thursday, April 4th, 2012
Day 5 of our spring break was by far our most adventurous day. Since we usually go to Missouri in the dead of winter, we don't usually get to be too adventurous. The weather cooperated beautifully on this day and we were able to take the kids out and let them run free. And Steve was able to see parts of his native land that he has never seen before. We left that morning and drove a few hours (because we just wanted to log a little more time in the car this trip) to Elephant Rocks. Above is the kids lifting up their feet and arms and holding their breath while we go over a bridge. We do a lot of this when we are in Missouri. Once we arrived at Elephant Rocks we had a picnic lunch.
And then we let the wild rumpus start.
The kids as well as the adults had a super fun time climbing all over the rocks.
And then we got to what I named the "Birth Canal". The Hobbs had been to Elephant Rocks for their Spring Break a few weeks earlier. They found this narrow gap between two rocks and their foreign exchange student, Mandi, managed to squeeze her way through. She did it again this time around, along with a few of the other kids. This is my old lady looking hand with my pinkie touching one side of the gap and my thumb touching the other. I was trying really hard not to hyperventilate the entire time people were birthing themselves through this tiny space.
Emily
Addy (I don't think she ever made it past the middle of the rock before she started freaking out and backed her way out. That is a lot farther than I would have been able to make it before the freak out started.)
Mandi
Aubrey
Austin
Yes, she really is that cute.
Hey! I actually made it into a picture!
Once we all regrouped, we decided to walk down a trail that led to an old railway station. Elephant rocks was an operating quarry in the 1800's and there is still a part of the old train depot there that you can see.
Tyler and Zac at the train depot
Addy
Aubrey
After leaving Elephant Rock's, we drove to Johnson Shut-Ins. Our first stop was the visitors center where I was just dying to find out how it got such an unusual name. We read a plaque in front of the visitors center that said the name "Johnson" came from the first settlers that lived there and were totally self sufficient. We thought maybe they were given the name "Shut-Ins" because they were shut-in and self sufficient in their community and never had to leave for anything. We had to draw this conclusion ourselves because in all the information we read it never once explained the interesting name. So we finally asked the ranger who was working in the visitors center and she explained the real reason it has that name. Shut-Ins is an Appalachian term for a Gorge. Ahhh...now that makes sense. I'm just thinkin'...that kind of info should have been included in all the other information about the place. Just sayin'. I'm just glad my brain was finally able to rest from all the conclusions I was drawing on my own about the name.
We finally left the visitors center and headed out for the good stuff. It would seem that back in the 80's Mountain Dew made a commercial at the Shut-Ins and ever since then, Steve has wanted to visit there. Over 30 years later, he finally got his wish.
The water was a tad bit on the chilly side- OK, it was way on the chilly side- but we shed our shoes and had so much fun climbing on the rocks an wading through the water.
OK, not all of us took our shoes off.
Aubrey and Mandi found a perfect place to sit between the rocks where the water was a perfect temperature. They sat and put their feet in the water and Mandi taught Aubrey how to write in Mandarin on the rocks with water.
That evening we were all exhausted as we piled into our vehicles to start the long drive home. We were going to try to make it home to eat dinner but our stomachs got the best of us. We stopped and had dinner at Taco Bell.
Aubrey and Mandi eating hot sauce straight outta the packets.
