Ghost Town and a Dry Creek Bed

 

"Sometimes her mom pretends she's sick and takes her to do fun stuff."
that was a little boy's explanation for why Mockingbird wasn't in school that day when his mother asked.  It's true, and was pretty much how we did Kindergarten.

This time it was joining Mr. Owl on a business trip to St. George, UT. The children and I ended up taking field trips of what once was.

Silver Reef ruins

 Silver Reef, a ghost town originally settled for mining, was a spot we visited twice. Once for the crumbling walls of by-gone homes, and again for the amazing personal museum tour that must have lasted well over an hour. The kids got to ring the actual mine bell, heft an iron iron, try out a hand drill and other contraptions pulled off the wall of tools. But the best was learning about the legendary  Charlie Parkhurst. He was the most colorful stagecoach driver of Wells Fargo, and his story got even better when he died and it was discovered he was a she.

Great stuff, we went home and our library kindly order a children's book for us about Charlie called Rough, Tough Charley. Written in unique, sparse verse this biography also has a map following Charlie's life and travels into the west.

Our hikes took us to Anasazi ruins and up a dry creek bed. The children had to help eachother up 5 foot dropoffs and around boulders and bushes, as I had a baby in a backpack. Besides, someone needed to take pictures.



Back down the creek bed

Anasazi food storage ruins

I wouldn't recommend this with an 8, 6, 3 year old, and 9 month old in the heat alone, with no reward but red rocks and more red rocks. But Mrs. Magpie hadn't been out in the wild in a very long time apparently. Fortunately children don't know any better, and humored my need to "just go and see what's around the next bend--I promise."