[El Puma]

I don't normally go out on weekends, but with such a stellar day and the kids out of school and done with soccer and full of energy and a recovering spouse at home that needed peace and quiet, we just HAD to do something! They're pretty adventurous and have done a bunch of hikes on our Colorado/Nevada road trip last summer, so it was time to see in how good a shape they still were. An old friend met us at the TH and off we went. At the first gully we had a snack, and I offered them the normal trail or the "steep, adventurous ascent straight up where you have to look for hidden stairsteps and get to rock-climb on top". The vote was unanimous, and we headed up the gully. (This is the way I usually go up by myself - I like the stairmaster-effect). Going was slow, as expected. Views were great; the kids enjoyed Rainier, and the ever-present fall colors.

About halfway up, just before the S-rib, the wind really hit hard - blew my 6-yo on her side a couple of times! In the steepest section they were hitting their wall, but bribes of milkshake and fries in N-Bend (we reserve junkfood for just such occasions, so it's always something special ) powered them through it. I continued my lectures from Colorado about hitting the wall and powering through it - my 8-yo "climbed" 14306ft Uncompaghre with me this summer and seemed to know how to deal with that concept). Once we hit the rocks, they took off like rockets as they just love scrambling. Met a whole plethora of people and canines on top, found a wind-still place to enjoy lunch and vast amounts of hot chocolate.

s081026GangOnGM-Goofing

The trail down was reported to be a bit slippery and icy, and we observed a lot of folks making their way back via the rocky E-ridge. However, it looked like we'd get into snow-covered rocks in places, and I wanted to avoid that with the kids. As it was, the trail WAS slippery, but in no place would you do more than fall on your butt and slide a few feet along the trail, which happened to the kids about every five steps. The ensuing laughter made me believe it wasn't necessarily their loss of footing that caused them to "fall"... Oh yeah, and the lengthy mud-stretches on the trail were of magnetic attraction, obviously. Great to see kids be kids !

We stopped at the little lakes (which had some cool ice-patterns on them) for a few pics with the remaining colors. The trail back was uneventful, though I got reminded why I like the gully - that trail goes on for a LONG time - especially when convincing a 6-yo with very little concept of time that it's "only an hour" back to the car... They were deservedly tired when we hit N-Bend, but the drive home was a study on the speed and effect of massive infusions of milkshake-sugar into a kid's blood stream! (One of the side effects is that they become really good singers - and loud ones, too ) On a side note: I'd say 80% of the doggage up there was not leashed up. This didn't bother us at all as we're dog-friendly (and the kids really enjoyed having "their own dogs" accompany them for a few stretches), and the vast majority of them was VERY well behaved and obedient, but I can see how someone could become intimidated by "self-hiking" dogs cruising around them...

[Magellan]

Thanks for putting up your kid-based TR. All parents need to hear about the good times so we can pull through the very short, crying plagued trips.

[Flora]

Cute kids! Enthusiastic young ones! Great to get such an early start hiking.

[EastKing]

Granite Mountain is a great mountain. Great trip report!!

[silly_traveler]

[Go Jo]

Nabbed your great TR for our small hikers thread, thanks for contributing!

[Mark Griffith]

Nice job on getting the kids out!