Hike {Pancake rocks}

We left the house at 8am and drove to the Springs, then turned to go behind Pike’s Peak. We’ve been to this trail head before to hike to the falls, but this time the goal was Pancake rocks and it was hard! The girls have hiked over 6 miles before and they have hiked +400-800 feet before, but this was +1,400 feet in 3 miles.

The trail is switchedbacked and up for the first mile, then you come to parting trails – Ring the peak, the falls and Pancake rocks.

The rocks trail is very steep and switchback for….ever, until you get past the tree line. We picked a good day, it was sunny, but shady on most of the trail with a slight breeze and in the 70’s. There was a bit of snow run-off so we had to cross the creek, but it wasn’t like the Lost lake run-off.

We would stop to take pictures (the girls had their LPS with them) and just catch our breath every so often.

Hannah wanted to stop and turn around, but I told her the rocks were our white whale – we must defeat them. It took an hour, but we made it.

We stayed at the top for a bit, had our snack and walked around the boulders, then commenced the tricky descent.

It was fine, no one fell or slipped, you just have to slow your roll or gravity and gravel will trip you up. Back at the bottom of the trail we split up, I went to the falls and the girls went to the beaver pond.

Someone built this awesome tipi.

Some of the views make me think of the Pacific NW with the green moss and pine trees.

I met them back at the car and we drove to Fargo’s for a very late lunch (3pm!)

I had promised them ice cream at Focus, but I knew their cafe would be closed, so we had ice cream and sundaes at Fargo’s and they were really good. It had started to rain about 30 minutes after we left the trail head, so we missed that storm on the hike.

It rained all the way home and we saw a rainbow for a while. No one wanted dinner, go figure, so we took Grace to youth group, bought some last minute stuff for comic-con and then called it a night. I have a feeling we’re going to be sore tomorrow!