My Life Is Not My Own

DAY TWO HUNDRED AND EIGHT

Whenever I have a day off I get this illusionary idea that I am going to be able to go to the mountains and do some great hike in cool weather. I should know better. With the wife working I have babysitting duty and the boys would rather hang out with their friends watching endless reruns on Nickelodeon than do something wonderful and memorable with their dear old dad. Kids. Also, my wife made an appointment for me to draw some blood--don't even ask!--so I had to be home by three in the afternoon even if I had taken the kids away by parental force. So my dream of cool mountain air vanished in the intense glow of family responsibilities. It's not the first time.

Since I couldn't get to the cool mountain air as I'd hoped it was back to the heat. Since I wasn't traveling far, Kahlua insisted on coming along.

We went just south of The Quarry and were quickly into the wilderness.

The horse trail heads up to the ridge above this canyon but this is a better way for hikers to go even though I am a bit concerned about snakes in all these boulders.

Hiking uphill in the sand in 100º heat was not what I'd hoped for today but, hey, it's better than working.

You can see the sun shining on Rabbit Peak in the distance but we are completely in the shade. If not for that, we wouldn't last an hour out here.

We make a nice little loop using one of the many trails out here and head back to a cooler with iced beverages.

There are some little dens and small caves along the mountain side but we don't see anything in there at the moment. Any critters may have sensed us coming and gone into hiding.

The one animal we see are bats flittering across the sky. There are hundreds of them but since I don't have my good camera (that's another family story) so I can't get any good pictures of them but trust me, they're out there.

We get to the water faucets near The Quarry but they have turned them off for the night and I don't have a key to turn them back on.

But that's OK. I prepared for that. Kahlua enjoys some iced water in the cooler and dreams it's a cold mountain stream.