Spring Break Part II–Miami Whitewater Forrest

It may have been April Fool’s Day on Friday but no joke!  I went on an eight mile bike ride with the family after a personal three year hiatus from biking due to pregnancy and caring for an infant.  Biking is a favorite pastime of mine which I did quite a bit of in Upstate New York with my friends and one of my Aunts back before I got married.  I still love it and now my kids are loving it too!  In fact this trip was the highlight of Spring Break for the kids.  They looked forward to this all week and we were glad that storms held off until evening.

We brought our five bikes and gear to Miami Whitewater Forrest which is just west of us and borders the state of Indiana.  They have a nice 8 mile paved trail through meadows, fields, woods and wetlands over bridges and through tunnels where bikers and pedestrians must yield to the right of way of horses. 

Nathan rode on the back of my bike with me, Kaitlyn rode with her Dad while Haley, Lindsay and Tristan rode with backpacks carrying our meal, tools, water bottles and first aid supplies.

To Tristan’s dismay he had outgrown his cool red bike and found that he did fit on his sister’s outgrown purple bike.  But once he put his “frog” horn on the handlebars he felt OK again.

We rode a couple miles on the outer loop and arrived at the wetlands lookout where we often see lots of birds and in the summertime lots of frogs too.  The kids did their best to quietly walk up the path.  Nathan thought it would be more exciting to jump in the water and it took lots of energy to hold him back.

 

At this time of year we did not see too much wildlife around the wetlands… or maybe it had more to do with the fact that I had not three or four but five somewhat noisy children with me.  I like the hills in the background.  In the summer there are fields of corn and sunflowers for miles. 

We were starting to get hungry and so decided to leave the bird watch and ride a few more miles.

Several miles down the path we stopped at the picnic shelter.  Tristan smiled as he exclaimed that we were getting to “eat out!… literally”.  We at fluffer-nutters, carrots, raisins and cuties.

After everyone was finished Haley was thrilled to find that she was carrying Oreos for dessert!  Nathan was equally impressed.  I was surprised to find that Haley had decided, once at the park and in the country air, that she was underdressed for the weather and had packed the “clean shopper” from the trunk to try to wrap up in when we were stopped for lunch.  I had a good chuckle over this once she whipped it out of the back pack and I thought maybe she could use it as a vest.  In the end she strapped the belt around her neck so she wore this thing as a cape… just to make me laugh!  I never thought this contraption had more uses other than to keep baby strapped in the shopping cart and from putting their mouths on the shopping cart.  Very creative!  While riding Haley exerted enough energy to keep warm with just her sweatshirt.  But during a game of hide and seek she turned the clean shopper inside out and it helped her become camouflaged with trees and grasses as she traded the colorful zoo animals for jungle green.

My two little buddies… they sure love each other.

Two brothers hanging out. 

A game of hide and seek… Nathan is learning!  After we had played around sufficiently we finished our journey of a few more miles.  I made it up the final hill without having to walk it in spite of having a 25 pound child on board and it being my first bike ride in nearly three years.  I attribute that ability to working out at the YMCA a few times a week.  It’s not biking but it is good exercise.

We loaded three bikes onto the back of our 16 year old car.  We threw the small bikes and the rest of the gear into the back of the van to make our way home for pizza and movie night.  We are looking forward to more rides this summer both at this park and on the trails along the “Great Miami” which travels at least up to Columbus, not that we’ll go that far!  But we like riding this route too and making a day of it.  We’re in the final 8 week stretch now until we have the free time to do such things.  We had a great end to our spring break.