This past weekend, nine of us, mostly from our jiu-jitsu/judo gym in Moore, took an 11-mile (18 klicks) trek through the Wichita Mountains. At least three hikers were brand new to ever hiking! I kind think they kind of dug it.
We arrived at the visitor center to take a quick bio break before heading to our first walkabout at Kite Trail to Bison Loop. This was mostly flat, but not entirely. Lots of great scenery and the weather was perfect. We did run into a goose who did not want to let us pass a bridge. She flailed her feathers and squawked at us. Eventually, though, we peacefully parted ways. She into the water and we across a dry bridge. Thank you, Canada Goose!
Following this nine-mile excursion, we hit the cars to drive over to Elk Mountain. This is one mile up and one mile down… or, at least is supposed to be.
We had three 11 year-olds with us and they were almost all beat after the nine miler, but we believed they still had juice so we headed onward. Four people from our group started up the mountain with tenacity and vigor, while five of us, two adults and three kiddos, were struggling. Well, to be clear, the kids were pretty wiped out, and one adult (me) was hitting the 70 percentile of pooped. We caught up with the rest of the group only to lose them again while lagging behind; then low and behold, we special five lost the trail somehow – or so we thought – so we turned around to head back to the car. This was a real adventure in that we were definitely not on the right path and even though there was only one way to head – down – we took some pathway down a strange heavy rocky area. It was an adventure in and of itself. Luckily though, one of the adults (not me) found a path and got us back to where we needed to be. Car in sight!
Before reaching the end of the mountain from where we began, we saw one of our groupmates running down the trail in search of us. A search party of ONE was sent! A teenage girl to the rescue. We were good, but we did discover that we were about 30 seconds from the top of the mountain before turning around. *heavy sigh*
After we all made it back to our vehicles we decided to go get some after hiking chomps at a small cafe called Ann’s Country Kitchen. Cool little diggs filled up with good people and yummy food. On the way there, though, a pretty mama longhorn and her calf were walking across the street in front of us. The baby was happy and frolicking. It was the best.
That’s all folks! Until our next big adventure.
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