Looking Back - Mayvia Adventure to the Beach July 2021

 

Heidi invited me and Jude to join her and the boys for a week at the beach camping out in their camper while the older kids were at camp.  Craig does a lot of work out in that particular area and was able to get us beach access on a private island of some of his clients.  One of them even let us swim in their private pool (that Craig built)! It was a GREAT week. Josh was even able to ride down with Craig toward the end of the week for a night. We even got caught in an amazing beach storm!

Track-Out Adventure To Laurel Hills Park - Another MayVia Experience

Traveling back in time to our spring track out.

We had a rocky start on this particular day.

After piling out of the party van and devouring our picnic lunch we quickly realized that the park we came to had just closed the day before for a renovation.  We were all pretty disappointed! We tried to make the best of it by walking along the trails but we kept coming to dead ends, except for this really cool tunnel. The kids were looking for "clues" through the graffiti and stuff they found inside.

It was hot. We had a plethora of disappointed kids. And we needed a plan fast.

Us mama's put our heads together. were on a quest for some kind of water hole.

Luckily we live near Falls Lake with a million different opportunities for adventure. And that's exactly what we did.  We found a deserted camp ground and took off for a cove to let the kids play around in the water.

MayVia Adventures To Forest Ridge Park

Next up on the MayVia tour of Wake County Parks and Rec was Forest Ridge Park.

This park was AMAZING!

It does have a playground, but this crew decided to hit the trails instead.  But first we went into the welcome center to get the complimentary backpacks stocked with binoculars, butterfly nets, maps, critter info cards, sketch pads and other gear to help us along the way.

Missy got to join in on this round so we had a little more backup!

We had a quick informational meeting before embarking on our journey, since we have a small village to keep in line, ha!

And then we took off to see what we could find.

Josh met up with us on his lunch break and snapped a cute pic of the kids altogether.

We found a few bugs along the way, and that was cool, but we loved just letting the kids run without a care in the world.

First we came up on this beautiful opening with a place to wade around in the water.

After we hung out a while we decided to keep following the trail...
and that is when the big open lake appeared!

The kids couldn't get there quick enough!

The sand was a favorite!  It was black and speckled with what looked like glitter.

It didn't take long for the kids to realize that they were at the water!

One by one they began to take their shoes and socks off and wade in the water.  But they kept getting deeper and deeper and caring less and less about their clothes getting wet...until Zeke decided he was just going to go for it and went all in.  The rest of the kids quickly followed suit.

We stayed as long as we possibly could before packing up to make the trek back to the car and head home.  The walk back was quite a bit slower, but full of stories from the day.

Someone (aka Josh) even left us clues so that we wouldn't get lost on the way back:)

We still want to keep making our rounds to new areas, but this park will definitely be revisited in the near future!

Track Out Adventures ~ Falls Dam

Josh and I are such creatures of habit.  We love adventures, but we always tend to go to the same places and do the same things and eat the same foods. But this year we're trying to branch out a little bit.  Like going to new places.  Ordering foods we have to look up on google just to figure out what they are and try new activities.

This new found desire to get out of the box decided to make its way into our track out adventures too.

Typically my anxiety keeps me from getting out and taking spontaneous adventures with the kids.  Who am I kidding, I hardly ever get out and adventure at all, lol.  But NOT THIS TRACK OUT! I was determined NOT to let my anxiety limit the possibilities as best I could.

I called up my partner in crime, we loaded up the party van and headed to Falls Dam. 

First of all, I hardly ever go to new places with all my kids without Josh.  Secondly, I NEVER am the one driving because that makes my anxiety even worse.  But again, I wasn't going to let that stop me this time!

We had no agenda, no time restraints and a party van full of adventure seekers just waiting to be unleashed. The weather was perfect and the setting was beautiful. This outing birthed an idea within Heidi and I.  We want to try to knock out as many new parks in our area as we can with these kiddos before they get too old to enjoy them (maybe...HOPEFULLY they never will!).