Stewart Falls Birthday Hike

Sometimes I'm a nature snob. I'll start thinking that popular places to hike are overrated or only for those not willing to venture out further into lesser known areas. Or maybe I start underrating them because I think they are too crowded. But sometimes I am reminded that there's a reason they are popular and crowded and it's okay. Stewart Falls is exactly in that category. It's a fairly easy 2 miles each way, easy even for young families, the trail from Aspen Grove is shaded most of the way so it can even be done on a hot day, and the falls are beautiful.

I had talked with Tyler about doing a number of outdoor things for my birthday together, but we decided to do this hike with our whole family and I don't regret it. Bailey was an angel riding in the backpack, maybe that was her gift to me. Usually after about 10 minutes she is squealing to get out, but this time she seemed content. I did take some precautionary measures--I gave her a sucker, we took the canopy off of the backpack because it wasn't too sunny and she likes it better off, and I cruised along at a good rate, not stopping long for distractions at all. Lucky for her there were lots of wildflowers to point out, and we saw a bluebird and a snake. She still hasn't forgotten the snake we saw at Capitol Reef so that was a big hit. She seemed happy and even was singing for a bit of the way.

At the falls she had fun getting her feet wet and throwing little rocks into the stream. Then we had Bailey making different faces.



I love how Bailey is reaching out to touch Caiden's head in this picture.

Here I am trying to get Bailey to touch the falls, it doesn't look like we are close enough, but believe me, it was closer than Bailey wanted to get, and we were getting wet.


It was again, a perfect hike, not too hot, not too long, great scenery. I loved it.