My Random Life: Caving Decisions

Usually I try to keep these fun and impersonal. Well I guess they are always personal but not really emotional. Well I just can’t help it today. I am an emotional mess…I have had to make some very important decisions in the last ten days. They have ranged from everything: my children, my intermediate family, and my friends. I’ve gotten two of them down with one to go. One of them was a tough one to make but “I know” I made the right one. The other one was the hardest one I might ever have to make and I can only “hope” I made the right one. In fact, that one was so tough that I can’t even move on to making the next one…it seems so trivial and meaningless compared and doesn’t really deserve my thoughts right now.

I know this doesn’t make any sense (I’m leaving out all the details), but really it is WAY too personal not only for me, but for the one it involves. I am holding it all in out of respect for them. I am looking forward to talking with a good friend when I get home though...hopefully she can help me understand it all (unfortunately she has way too much experience in these matters ;) I just need to try to put all this on the back burner for the next two weeks so I can enjoy this trip with my family. These RV trips are usually the highlight of our summers and I don’t want to ruin this one due to my negative attitude and wondering thoughts.

Okay, Okay…on with the trip :) We spent our first few days in Cleveland. The Cleveland Metroparks Zoo is my favorite zoo. We visited it two years ago and had a wonderful time. Unfortunately it was just too hot this time. We still grinned and bared it though ;) Aspen did so well (I forgot our stroller and it was just too hot to carry her) and kept up with us without even complaining. When a three year old doesn’t complain much about walking in the heat it is kind of hard to complain yourself. We missed the Rainforest section again (I guess we will just have to go back) but the Kangaroo walk was just as fun as before. I saw my first Joey (the cutest thing) in its mother’s pouch. He never hopped out, but he would stick his head out and graze as his mother did.

They all "had" to have their pic taken with the wolf.

That rope is the only thing between you and the roos.

We are now in Mill Run, PA. I had never heard of it before either so don’t scratch your head too much ;) If you have ever heard of Ohiopyle State Park then you know where we are. I would really like to come back here in a few years when Aspen is a little older. There appears to be lots to do and a good place to camp for a week. They have some really great hiking/biking paths, whitewater rafting (min age is five), horseback riding, and a couple cool exhibits like Kentucky Knob and Fallingwater…they are some famous houses I guess, but there is a minimum age for those tours too.

We did get to enjoy a few things at the park today. I dragged Marc to the Laurel Caverns. Getting there was the usual House of 1000 Corpses adventure. Marc

and I may need to take a break from scary movies for awhile. The navigation in our car was taking us through all these back roads (dirt roads going up a mountain to be exact) passing through rural trailer parks. It didn’t help that there were NO other cars in sight. The real funny part was the address we put in wasn’t even an address…it was an address that you use to get to signs directing you to the caverns. So Marc started going on, “What if this is a trick…what if the directions/signs are only to get you lost?” Does everyone that tries to follow these directions freak out like we do??? I am starting to think we have just watched a little too many horror flicks.

So of course we didn’t stay on route…we chickened out a mile away and turned around. I had seen a sign way back that pointed to the caverns (Marc didn’t want to take it because it went against the navigation). The signs brought us to our destination…YAY. Seeing other cars in the parking lot and people leaving with smiles was a plus. When we left we went the opposite direction and found out that if we would have stuck with our navigation for half a mile longer it would have spit us out to the main road we were on. We have got to put a little more faith in the system. Oh well…I will take the extra twenty minutes it took to backtrack and go a longer way to surely end up in one piece :)

I think I have mentioned before that Marc is claustrophobic. He wasn’t too thrilled with me when he found out we were going down into a cave. I didn’t really think it would be a big deal (he survived a tour through the Mammoth Caves two years ago…and actually liked it) but I caught him giving me the evil eye several times during our decent. It’s kinda funny watching him get scared a little while the rest of us are comfortably content. The boys might have been a little too comfortable, Nicholas kept walking ahead of us and Blake got teased by our guide about putting his tap dancing shoes away. The highlight of the tour was when all the lights were turned off and we got to see a beautiful light and music show.

The boys overlooking the statepark.

Cucumber Falls

After the caverns we went back to the state park and followed a little trail to Cucumber Falls. It was a really kewl waterfall. It reminded me a lot of this waterfall we went to in Maui. It even had the same kind of trail (only much shorter). The kids loved it and the boys want to bring their bathing suits if we ever go back…we will ;). I never realized that Nicholas was such a little climber. He made up his own trail climbing the

outer rocks back up. After that we went to the big waterfall…Ohiopyle Falls. It was beautiful. It was very similar to Sioux Falls. The boys and I climbed down so we could touch the raging water, but we were quickly beckoned by Marc to get our butts back up and away from it…he doesn’t love us or anything ;)