Sick Happens

DAY TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY SEVEN

Monday morning and I've got the day off. All I have to do is get the kids to school and I've got most of the day to head to higher elevations to hike in the cool alpine air.

There's a reason people hate Mondays.

I went to get my son, Nikolas, out of bed to get him ready for school and he was sick. I should have expected it. He'd been ill with a sore throat, congestion and a slight fever for the past three days and today was the day his illness peaked. Hiking plans cancelled. Again.

Instead of a nice hike in an alpine environment I was relegated to hiking by my house in the desert but I have to say I was pleasantly surprised. The weather was the nicest of any evening in months. By the time I finished the temperature was in the 80s. By comparison, a couple of weeks ago when I started hiking it was 113º and still over 100º when I finished. So eighty some degrees felt heavenly.

Having to stick close to home I go hiking near my house but instead of taking the trails I've taken before before I decide to go cross country and see what I can see. Maybe I'll find a place for the next Kahlua Trail.

Somebody's been up here doing something. It looks like someone wants to come up here and roast a pig. If they do, I hope I'm invited.

Maybe this is being prepared as the kitchen area. I'll have to check this out later and see what kind of progress goes on up here.

I follow along the base of the hill and it seems like it would be a good place to have a trail.

Someone else thought so, too. Kahlua walks along a row of rocks that someone had laid out to mark a trail along the hillside. Nice.

It'll be a little tougher to build a trail through this. What's that under those rocks?

How did that get down there?

Cutting down into the wash Kahlua and I decide to follow this back. We've walked on enough rocks for the day.

We hit the trail and head back home. Nik feels much better this evening but then don't sick kids always feel better once school is over?