fighting creek park

Why do boys fight?  My boys are to the kicking- pushing- and- occasional- punching stage.  It IS a stage, right?  I hope not just in my house!  It is something I will never understand, but I guess it's fitting to write a post about Fighting Creek Park, our newest discovery and very close to home.

Juan Pablo always puts me in charge of, "Where are we going to go today?"  It had to fit his qualifications though...walking, park, not sunny, possibly water.  And that's how we stumbled upon this park.

Many of the trees and plants are labeled at the entrance to the playground area.  They all look like poison ivy to me, so I just keep to the trail.

There was a brand new, huge, awesome playground for the kids to enjoy.  I'm always drawn to parks to discover a little more about the world and nature around me, and their first question out of their mouths is always, "Is there a playground?"

These are some super-steep slides, so the kids pretended they were the Warp Wall from American Ninja Warriors.  Well, really, the whole playground was turned into a ninja course for a few minutes there.

There were some smaller parts for little Carmen, but I thought it was funny that the sign on the equipment said for ages 2-12.  There's really something out there that covers the ages of all my children?!

Diego has a talent for climbing...he can climb walls, poles, trees...anything that goes up.

And the skinniest little arms you've ever seen...I don't know how he does it.

Even one arm and he doesn't fall off!

I always love a playground that includes music.

There are lots of knobs to turn and things to do here.  There is absolutely no way a kid could not love this place.  Well...I may have to take that back.  Joaquin had a white spider on his arm as he was trying to climb the rock wall and freaked out.   Joaquin and spiders just do not mix well.

There's a very cool covered bridge nearby.  Way more amazing in person.

We stopped at the amphitheater seats for awhile and tried to throw rocks into this hole in a hallowed out tree.  No one peeked out like we were hoping.  We did NOT throw that stick in there, but JP did his best to throw another and missed.

A quick family picture before heading on...

There was lots to see along the freshly poured rock trails, including these odd looking fungi.

There were benches, picnic tables, and even disc golf cages along the way to look at.

And way into the trail, these little exercise points started showing up.  These balance beams were on springs, which made them just a little more interesting.  We tried to play 'who could make someone fall off first' but we all have really good balance, so we just had to continue on walking.

And see that awful thing Diego is sitting on?

Well, those yellow bars ended up knocking Carmen in the head and she fell flying onto her back.  Poor thing got a little knot on her head, but I was amazingly prepared with an icepack from the snack bag I'd brought along.

Our goal this whole time had been to search for a waterfall that was noted on the map.  I figured it would be small because I don't know of any falls around here, but we would have missed it completely if it weren't for Abuelo spotting it.  It was a little trickle down a large flat rocky area, just beyond this picnic table.

Diego bravely walked down the falls area onto a little island in a muddy looking pool and tested out how deep it was.  No one fell in, but I was prepared with a change of clothes just in case.

Beautiful tall trees shaded us the entire walk.  I can't wait to see this place in fall.

Diego's energy finally gave out on the way back, just for a bit.   But that's what piggy backs are for, right?