You know how I said we needed to get back out on the trail for family hikes? And how it was such a great way to connect with my teen and almost teen boys? Well, it looks like I’m going to get my wish.
The older boy wants to earn his Hiking Merit Badge for Boy Scouts. That is a great goal for him! And also means we’ll be back out on the trail as a family a lot over the coming spring and summer. Especially since the younger boy will want to earn his badge too.
I just looked up the requirements. And I couldn’t help thinking to myself – “Wow! We just did almost all of that training for the Grand Canyon hike. Why, oh why, did we not pay attention and do the preparation and book-work for this as we trained?”
The requirements for this are pretty straight forward. He needs to walk one 5-mile hike, three 10-mile hikes, one 15-mile hike and one 20-mile hike. Stopping for short rest periods and meals as needed are allowed, stopping overnight is not. And he needs to do the preparation and planning for these hikes.
We’ve already done all of that except the 20-mile hike and we were in perfect shape to finish off with that hike right after we got back from the Grand Canyon.
Then I realized – you know what this does? This gets us back out on the trails together as a family. It gets us all working together on hiking goals. It gets the boys planning where we’ll hike and what we’ll eat on the trail. And it makes it all their idea!! That is pretty great.
Wonder where they’ll take us? I’m hoping somewhere in the Southwest.
