Starved Rock State Park

The fun way to get my exercise  :-)

Sarah and I hiked at Starved Rock State Park today!

I usually have to work or play practice, errands, or something. But I had nothing planned for this afternoon/evening! I asked Sarah if she wanted to go hiking at Starved Rock.

We both are always prepared and packed bags with water, sunblock, and snacks. My bag also contained some bandaids (I'm lil accident prone) and of course my meds and inhaler (which I rarely ever use, even when I'm indeed needing it).

We started by first heading into the trails towards Pontiac Canyon, then we walked over to the River Trail and enjoyed the veiw of the River. Once we  were almost to horsehoe bend we had to turn around (where it looks like I made a mistake with the higlighter). Which wasn't a mistake, we started to hear thunder and decided to head back towards the lodge. We had to back track probably .25 miles. But we took the hiking trails past 4 more canyon/spots on the way back.  Seeing rock formations, the beautiful wildlife, and a turkey & deeer uplcose was definetly a perk to hiking (rather than jogging on a bike path or around my neighborhood).

Towards the end of our hike we came to this lovely site... We didn't notice that when we started hiking we were slowly declining. Now, here were the stairs we had to go back up in order to head back on the new route. Otherwise, we had to turn around and go the same way back. We decided to forge ahead. We had done probably 50 stairs total up to this point. At one point while huffing and puffing up the stairs I said "Sarah, at least we can see the top." I was wrong, we get up farther and realize the stairs turn to the right and there are another 30 or so more. A guy who was walking down the path saw my unenthusiastic face and cheered me on by saying "you're almost at the top!" I then looked at Sarah and said "Next time we are coming down this way and going up the other way..."

We came out on the wrong side of the Lodge and had to walk around it. I think we walked about 3 miles today. I normally jog 2.5, so that works for me!    

I'm glad we came out at the wrong side though because Sarah and I saw this:  Its the sign we used for girls scouts. Sarah and I have been friends since Kindergarten and both our moms were our Girl Scout leaders for 10 years! We learned everything we know about nature and hiking in GS. I still have my Junior Vest actually; Some of my favorite childhood memories include Sarah and Girl Scouts, so it was the perfect way to end our day!

As you can see there are many more Canyons for me to see! I hope to go again really soon! If you aren't somebody who wants to jog, try hiking, or biking, or playing tennis, roller blading, rock climbing! The more exercise I do the more I like it (I didn't expect to enjoy it this much)!