homeschool

I had a hard time finding books for book club (at least initially) when I was planning last summer.  I had expected to use lots of classics, but I found that My Little Man had read every single one I pulled off the library shelf!  After pestering our friendly librarian for lots of book topics, she suggested the Stranded series by Jeff Probst as a great survival story – and I’m glad she did.

The trilogy is about four kids, new siblings in a blended family, who get stranded on an island in the South Pacific and need to find a way to work together – and to survive.  They’re fairly short, easy reads, and each book has cliffhanger endings until the third, which is why I asked the book clubbers to read all three.

In the third book, there’s an incident with a cliff and three of the kids.  When I read that scene, I knew we needed to do some climbing – and the idea for our treetop adventure with Go Ape USA was born.

I worked primarily with a man named Jon at Go Ape’s headquarters, who gave our group a discount, patiently explained the details and rules to me, and helped us get set up.  There’s a lot to know, because the rules and pricing vary for different age groups, and I wanted to make sure that our adventure went smoothly.  Go Ape also requires one adult for every two kids, and so it was important to stay on top of the numbers – and for good reason.  More on that soon ….

We got everyone together for a group picture before we headed off for our training session.  Most of us were really excited, but a few people were pretty nervous, and, again, for understandable reasons:  we were headed 50 feet up into the treetops and would tackle ziplines up to 500 feet long.

After getting outfitted with our harnesses, our Go Ape instructor walked us through a mini training course on the ground so that we could encounter the different scenarios we would face in the air.  This was critical because no instructor would be in the air with us.  We’d be in charge of hooking ourselves in and out of the safety gear.

Soon we were headed up ladders and into the trees.  We were each decked out with a harness that stayed on us the entire time, and we used double lines and carabiners to attach the safety lines to our harnesses at each station.  We went through five courses, with each one starting with a ladder and spiraling higher and higher into the treetops.

We encountered lots of these obstacles in the air.  We were always supported by safety lines and our harnesses, of course, but we walked over wires, free-fell into nets, walked across swaying, wooden bridges, and much more.  A few times there were even options for different paths with varying difficulties.

The sky was a beautiful blue on the day of our trip but the temperatures remained in the 40s, and oddly enough, we had several inches of snow the day before.  Our landings from the ziplines were often a bit muddy, but since the trees hadn’t budded out yet, we could see pretty far, and the views were incredible.

It was fun to see everyone trying new things – only about three of us had done anything like this before – and we all worked together well.

Many of the obstacles were harder than they appeared, and they really tested your physical strength – and your bravery, too.

I dreaded this type of obstacle.  They’re really hard for people like me with short legs, but even though I’m not any taller than I was the last time I did a course like this, it was easier.  Maybe because I could depend on my harness to help me, or maybe because I was completely responsible for two girls and had to keep up with them – maybe both! – but while it was challenging, it was doable.

Even though I planned this outing and knew the benefits of it, I’m rather glad I wasn’t able to see my kids zipping.  While I checked my Big Helper’s gear to be sure that she was hooked in properly before she stepped off the platform, she was quickly out of sight amidst the trees, and my Little Man was zipping around with DH, so I couldn’t see it.  Even when you know it’s safe, it’s still hard to see your people jump out of a tree.

I’m thankful that a friend took such amazing pictures of them, though, so that we can remember our adventures – and that I couldn’t see them until we were all safely on the ground.  Thanks, Lynn!

Sticking landings were hard and quickly became everyone’s goal, though most of the time we just landed on our bottoms in the mulch.

Did I mention that we were up really high?

I loved hearing and seeing the teamwork that happened during this event.  Although I about half expected complaints, tears, or even a refusal to go up, everyone bravely strapped on their gear and climbed the ladders – even the people I knew were scared.  I heard people cheering each other on, encouraging comments being yelled from one obstacle to another, and cheering when someone completed a hard obstacle.  It was great!

My Little Man was one of those not wanting to go, and, really, Go Ape was bigger than anything any of us had done before.  We watched the videos, we talked about harnesses and zipping and what to do if you were scared, but he wasn’t sure about the whole thing; when we got there, however, he was all in, and he wanted to take the hardest route every time there was a choice.  He absolutely loved it and has asked several times to go back.

We definitely made memories during our treetop adventure for the Stranded trilogy with Go Ape.

Have you ever done a treetop adventure course?

We’ve been doing this book club thing with my daughter for six years now.  She was a good reader before we started, but my goals have changed a bit along the way.  I want more than just fun with books and friends now – I want to be able to dig in to the books and bring them to life.  I’m looking for springboards for good discussions about life and faith and choices.  I want to see thoughts and experiences that my book clubbers can take with them into the future.

That’s why I chose Nature Girl by Jane Kelley for our February book choice.  It was an unusual choice for me as the main character Megan was annoyingly selfish in the beginning, but what makes the book so great is the way that she grows throughout the story.  Her transformation – and the determination it takes her to complete the quest she’s given herself along a piece of the Appalachian Trail – is quite discussion worthy.

That’s how we found ourselves talking about Megan over lunch at Chick Fil-A in Durham.  We all expressed our irritation with her selfish ways in the beginning of the book and whether we felt there was redemption for her by the end.  We talked about what it must take to hike the full length of the Appalachian Trail and how we would personally handle moving to another region of the country for the summer like Megan’s family did.

Then we set off.

Not on the Appalachian Trail.  As much as I wanted us to go and hike a part of that, it’s closest point to us is a few hours away, and that wasn’t really feasible.  Instead, we headed out to hike a part of the Mountains-to-Sea Trail, a path still in creation here in North Carolina that does just want it’s name declares:  it starts on Clingman’s Dome in the mountains and finds it’s way to Jockey’s Ridge in the Outer Banks along the Atlantic, a journey of 1,175 miles.  We chose to hike a six-mile portion along the Eno River in Durham, the same distance that Megan hiked each day of her journey.

We started at the Cole Mill access point to the trail.  The temperature was in the low-to-mid 60s and the sun was out in full force, making it a beautiful day to hike.  

The first part of the trail was the roughest, as we climbed down to the river and then walked along a narrow dirt path along the bank.  We were happy to discover many trees fallen into the water, however, that were lined with turtles sunning themselves.  This photo op – and the happy turtle above – kept us observing them for a little while before resuming our hike.  We continued to see turtles all along our six-mile trek – nearly 80 of them altogether!  Turtles are thriving in the Eno River.

The next part of our trek took us up stairs built into a hill, across a road, along a bridge, and down the other bank to the other side of the river.  Road construction on the bridge kept the traffic to a minimum, making this part of our hike safer for us, and then we were back on the trail and moving along.  The next few miles of the trail were the roughest, with an abundance of rocks and roots, making the hike not difficult, but making it important to watch your foot placement carefully.

There was a lot to see along the way, though.  A neat feature of this stretch of trail are the historical ‘ruins’ we encountered along the way.  There are remnants of an old pump station, and there are stone foundations, stone walls, earthen ridges, and more stretched out along a half-mile.  The girls loved climbing all over these!

Besides turtles, there were lots of neat natural elements to see, too.  The kids spotted a small brown snake along the trail at one point, along with lots of beaver slides and trees that beavers had cut down.  We saw birds flying and spotted a woodpecker going to town on a tree.  The trillium was just about to burst into bloom all along the trail, and the grasses were a brilliant green.

Just before we crossed the river for the last time, we began to encounter the remnants of houses.  This one featured a sturdy stone chimney still standing, and the kids enjoying trying to climb it to sit on the mantle.  The foundation was still visible, too, and we found pieces of a stove, bedsprings, and old pump all nearby.  It was interesting to try to piece together what we found and guess about who might have lived there and what their lives were like.

After another two miles, we crossed our last creek and headed for the homestretch.  Because we were so close, we stopped to play at the river’s edge, which for most of the kids meant throwing in rocks or crossing a small dam to a peninsula-like piece of land a few feet across the water.  Unfortunately, several kids fell in at this point, but at least it was near the end of the hike, and they came up wet but laughing.  I imagine it wasn’t any colder than what Megan experienced when she fell in that river in Massachusetts!

My Big Helper and I secretly laughed at two of these girls along our hike, because they kept saying that instead of ending our hike at the six-mile point, they wanted to turn around and hike back to the beginning.  After falling in the river, however, and finishing our trip, they changed their minds and were happy to sit down and rest.

They didn’t rest for long, however!  The girls were soon up and climbing around on trees and playing tag while we waited for our rides to pick us up.  They’re full of energy!

Nature Girl was a great book for our club and has sparked lots of conversations in our family about the importance of discipline, hiking, and nature conservation.  We’re  hoping to do more long hikes in the future.  

What about you?  Are you a hiker?