Memories of yesteryear

Since I have had the opportunity to visit family, it of course brings back fond memories. As part of our visit we went to Bandelier National Park in the Jemez Mountains in NM. Going to National parks, hiking, and camping were a standard part of my life growing up, so I was excited to share this with my kids. Logan and Aurora did great. Logan especially loved it. It was a good hike that went up through forests to see old indian dwellings. Logan did great climbing up the ladders to the caves where they dwelled hundreds of years ago. I was nervous watching Logan head up the ladders, but he was not afraid at all. Aurora, not a fan of heights. I tried to take a picture of her at the opening of a cave on the ladder, but no smiles were to be found. Just big tears and loud objections:) Needless to say we moved on quickly, as to not disturb the others that were trying to enjoy the caves. The total time of walking was two hours. There was more to see, but we opted out due to the pending rainstorm. Logan made it the whole way. Aurora was the queen in the stroller and she was even carried up some portions of the hike (stairs). We opted out on seeing the ceremonial kiva, because it looked like rain was coming our direction and it was up 140 feet vertically (not quite what I want to do with the kids at their current ages). So moving on...

The squirrels are quite friendly and an Albert squirrel got quit close to Logan before running past to leap up a tree. Logan followed him and thought it was neat when that squirrel jumped in the tree. A few yards down the row, we saw a rock squirrel. He was just hanging out and we were able to get within a foot of him before he scurried away. BTW, the only reason I know the names of the different squirrels is because I read the signs about the different wildlife you can see there :)