And they were never heard from again...

Well, our little trip to the park turned into quite an adventure. Thinking we'd take a nice easy hike, see the water fall, then hike out and have a nice lunch, all in about 2 hours, we set out happily into the park. The trail we chose started off nice enough with spectacular views along the edge of the extremely steep, extremely deep ravine. As we progressed, however, the trail became narrower, and began to slope to the left (toward the ravine) - yikes!

We eventually came to a fork and decided to take the path which led down to the riverbed. Now the trail became very steep - straight downward! And it was covered with all manner of acorns and dried leaves making it extremely slippery, with the edge of the canyon only inches away!

Despite the fears of sliding to the bottom, we did manage to make our way safely to the dried up river bed, only to find it was not the nice flat riverbeds I've hiked before, but rather laden with huge boulders, pebbles, medium sized rocks, and everything in between. Some of the rocks would move when you stepped on them, and there was water in parts making the rocks potentially slippery. So you can imagine this slowed our progress considerably. We plucked away along the riverbed for what seemed like an eternity, and we finally came across other "survivors" going the opposite direction who said the "other trail was WAAAAY back there". Which meant we would have eons further to travel. We had to make the decision of turning around or continuing on to meet up with another trail so we could get off the river bed. After much debate, we decided to continue on instead of turning back. (and they were never heard from again...)

Another eon later, we found a trail and got the heck off the river bed - none too soon! We immediately came upon another group that was seemingly lost, trying to figure out what to do as well. (side note: we came across several others after this and all seem to be frustrated by the map and the lack of good signs along the trails) We decided to follow them up, up, up and out of the canyon which was no easy feat either because we had to hike straight up a steep incline similar to what we had encountered on the way down (but thankfully no acorns). Then along another very narrow trail along the edge of the ravine to a set of unforgivingly long stairs, and finally to the road. Never been so glad to see asphalt in my life!

But the bad news? We were on the other side of the park from our car so we had to walk about 2 miles back. All told, a 4 hour hike. And the kicker? We drove to the other side of the park to the Inn which has a restaurant because at this point food was pretty much top priority. Well, they had stopped serving lunch 30 minutes ago. (*sigh*)

So basically, we took the trails marked "VERY RUGGED" (they weren't kidding) turning out to be the most challenging trails in the park.

I iced the ol' ankle after lunch for a good long time, and then again when we got home a couple hours later. And today? I ran 2 miles outside on the asphalt. So if my ankle can survive that crazy hiking trip and then run 2 miles the next day, I think I may be able to get past this injury after all! :) Happy Days!

Oh, and did I mention only 11 days until my next race? I will be SO ready!