Pinnacles National Park

A couple of weeks ago, Chris and I randomly went hiking, just drove, found a park, and walked the hills.
So, last Sunday, we decided to try Pinnacles National Park and took the Moses Rim Trail, a trail of "moderate difficulty."
Peeps let me give you a warning: unless you're a super hiker with repelling equipment, you don't want to take any of the "strenuous" trails. Chris and I aren't necessarily experienced hikers and I'd like to think we're not out of shape, but the trails get steep and rocky.  Still, it's AWESOME. Beautiful views.
The Moses Rim Trail takes you through Bear Gulch caves. I was so excited about these! Being from Florida, I had never seen caves before--these weren't like the ones you see on wilderness specials, but they were pretty cool. The trail then takes you out onto the reservoir. From that point we could have turned around and taken the path back through the caves OR continue up the mountain and go back through the woods, coming out where you began.
We took the way up and around, mainly because I didn't want to walk down this teeny, tiny staircase. There were some spaces where the rock wall jutted out and you had to somehow avoid the wall while moving forward and not falling over the guardrail, which, several times, seemed far too short to save you from falling to . . . something . . . injury?
My fear of heights kept telling me "death death DEATH!!!"  but that probably wasn't a possibility . . . unless I broke my neck . . . which, I guess is always a possibility so . . . well . . . Bottom line: High places--I don't like them. At all. Nope. The handrail is my bff like totally for sure. Seriously. Handrail = awesome.
Meanwhile, Chris is strutting ahead, goading, "You know what's REALLY fun? Not holding onto the rail. You should try it. Come on, let go!"
"Chris, I will KILL you. KILL. YOU." 

 

 

The reservoir . . . and the Asian tourists we kept running into . . . there were quite a few tourists, which made going up and down that tiny staircase complicated. 

Some of the trees were covered in this red substance. Really awesome looking.

That teeny, tiny little pine tree made my heart glad.  Just so tall and proud and little. :]

If you ever choose to do Pinnacles, it's so worth the time and the heat.  Be sure to have a trail map because the trails do branch off.  Chris is all about "exploring" the hike, which is great, except that the last time he tried exploring on a hike, I ended up screaming the entire time because I was afraid we were going to get lost or eaten by alligators (at Lake Jessup, that's a REAL possibility since those suckers are twelve feet long).  This time around, Chris is trying to scale mountains, squeeze through cracks, and just run off in various directions while I'm begrudgingly trying to keep up, worried that, once again, there's a real possibility we could get lost, die, and no one would find the bodies.
Melodramatic? Me? Heavens no! Why do you ask?

In the end, the hike took us roughly three hours and four bottles of water (ALWAYS have water an sunscreen handy for these kinds of excursions).

When my mom comes to visit in a week and a half (YAY!!!) we are totally planning on taking her to Pinnacles. Can't wait!