Week in Clearfield

We have been spending the week living at the Comfort Inn and swimming only keeps the girls busy for so long so we have started GeoCaching.  It is a high tech scavenger hunt using the internet and a GPS.  There are some special ones in Clearfield County that have stamps you can put in a book and if you get enough you get a prize, so the girls are all over that.  It has helped to become familiar with the area and have fun at the same time. 

After the Open House on Thrusday we went to see the Mountain Laurel (sorry no picture of that) and while we were doing that we cam across Anderson Creek.  We pulled off to get some pictures and check it out.  The girls asked if they could put their feet in and walk around a little.

Which lead to a little more, and a little more.

They were really having a fun time.

Until they slipped and fell in, then they decided it was not so fun anymore, so we headed back to Clearfield.

The drive back was beautiful, of coarse the pictures do not do it justice, but you could see for miles.  It was so pretty with the "bourgh" in the valley and "hills" all around.  I am not so sure what to call them "hills" or "Mountains."

You can see the plant right in the middle of the picture below.

On Saturday we all went (Eric too) to State College to the Spring Creek Family Festival at the Millbrook Marsh Nature Center.  A.K.A. tree huggers festival as Eric called it.  It was fun for the kids, they got their face painted, did a scavenger hunt, learned about rocks, played bird bingo, and participated in a duck race.  Not so ultra exciting for Eric but he was a good sport.


On Sunday the girls and I headed to the laundromat while Eric went to work for a bit.  Then we all went to Parker Dam, a State Park somewhat nearby.  The girls really wanted to go hiking.  We had never really gone hiking before so we got a map at the Ranger Station at choose The Trail of New Giants.  Later on I read that is was "more difficult hiking," but we all had fun and had some incredible views. 

Starting out all smiles.

A self done pic by Karinda at the top of the vista.

This was the view from the top of the Vista, once again the pictures do not do it justice, but it was beautiful.  You could see a lot of the park.  The lake in the middle is Parker Dam and that is where we started from.

Eric and his "cats"  I have no idea where it comes from but that is what he calls them and is kind of spreading to not just their daddy calling them "the cats."

Eric even posed for one with just me!!!

On the way down the trail.

Back to the road and still smiles.  The girls found this little stream and wanted thier pictures by it.  I think my camera was still on landscape setting, they really are not ghosts.

When we had first got there someone asked if we wanted to go to the CCC museum and I told him we would next time.  Little did I know it was only open Sunday afternoons.  This is a the machines used when making the dam and all the roads in the park.  Thank goodness for modern machinery. 

We walked across the big rocks at the dam.

 And climbed huge boulders on the other side.

The one creature we found.

 We had a great day exploring a new part of the country.

And to top off an already awesome day, Daddy went swimming with the girls.