When we moved the Pacific Northwest, hiking quickly became part of our life. Most weekends we opt for urban hiking on city trails close to our house like Discovery Park or Carkeek Park. Packing up and planning to take two kids under three is a lot of work. When we stay closer to home, we don’t have to take as much food and gear.
Ryan asked what I wanted to do for Mother’s Day this year. He said he would watch the kids and I could go do something alone or we could have a family day. I decided a family hiking day sounded ideal. We got on the Washington Trail Association website to research what trail we wanted to do. I love this website and you can filter hikes based on criteria you want. I always filter on kid friendly hikes so we don’t get in a situation where the trail could be too dangerous for us.
Boulder River was the perfect hike. We only did the 1.25 miles in to the waterfalls and back. The trail is wide and not steep so if your little ones are actually hiking and not being carried, you should feel safe. There are some big drop-offs along the trail so we kept Logan in his Osprey pack for most of the hike. We let him out at the waterfalls to explore and let him walk about the last half mile of the hike. He did really good that last half mile and it gave me confidence to let him walk and not be in his pack the entire time. You should always read the updates of the wta.org or Trailblazer app. People are really good about updating trail conditions and more. We knew the service road leading in was going to be filled with potholes and it was. Bouncing on the potholes was the worst part of the day. This hike was one I would do again!!
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