NYE Box Hill Hike

Over the break we've definitely clocked a lot of inside home time.  We were all starting to go a little stir crazy so on New Year's Eve we drove 45 min. south to go on a walk at Box Hill, a national trust site.  The moment we got out of the car we knew it was going to be messy.  There was water and mud everywhere.  While we weren't necessarily dressed for it, at least the kids were in wellies and J&I had our hiking shoes/boots on.

The first part of the hike was completely downhill, mostly down slippery, muddy steps.  Both kids fell more than once.  At first they were bothered by it but they soon got over it and even tried pushing their luck. 


At the bottom we were promised "stepping stones" in the river, which we could walk across to get to the other side.  Problem was that with all the rain and flooding, the steps were nowhere to be found, buried under the water.  There was a pretty strong current as well so even if the steps were visible it would not be safe enough to walk across.  Definitely a disappointment for the kids although we promised to come back in the spring/summer when the water levels would surely be lower.

Luckily down the way a bit was a bridge that allowed us to cross the river into a big meadow.  By this time both C &K were completely muddy and decided rather than fight it they might as well see how muddy they could get.  This of course thrilled J & I (not!).



Once we crossed the meadow I made a navigational error which took us off track for a bit until J took over map duties and put us back on course.  The next big challenge was the hike up Box Hill.  We knew at some point we'd have to go back up and up it was.  This hill was huge; standing below you couldn't see the top of it.  And while there were some steps at the beginning, they stopped about a quarter of the way up and turned into a very steep and slippery path.  At this point we ventured out into the field itself to hike up the hill - still challenging but much less slippery.



Finally we made it to the top!  Winded but accomplish filled.

At some point, we ventured off course again but luckily we were close to the visitor center so we made it back without too much trouble (thanks google!).  The kids rode home in their underwear and without shoes.  They thought it was a great hike!