Growing up, we often used to make treks to the top of Kennesaw Mountain, both for the exercise and the views. I've been waiting for the time that our little ones are big enough for them to join us on these climbs, and we decided to give it a try this past July 4th. After all, it may be called a "mountain" but that term is really stretching it in comparison to the truly large mountains of the world. It is no Everest or Kilimanjaro. It's only about a mile to the top. True, it can be pretty steep at times, but still, it's only a mile. We could do this, I was sure. Perhaps I was a little too optimistic...
It started inauspiciously enough. We (and thousands of our closest friends) parked our van in the parking lot down the road and began pushing our double stroller (with room for two, but not three, riders) towards the mountain. We made it to the sign and posed for a proud picture for the memory book (err...blog).
Shortly after this picture was taken (as in 15 steps later), it all started to fall apart - well short of the base of the mountain. Caleb was tired and didn't want to walk anymore. That's when we started in with the bribery. If he could make it to the top of the mountain, he would get a big, giant ice cream cone. We were more or less able to drag him to the base of the mountain - not quite kicking and screaming...yet. But once the real climbing commenced, he had had enough. Thankfully, Wren was itching to walk, so she hopped out of the stroller and he hopped in, in what was the beginning of the longest game of musical chairs (stroller?) I think I've ever played - and most certainly the longest climb up Kennesaw Mountain I've ever had.
I was certain that Wren could make it to the top judging by the vigor in which she started her climb. The girls left the boys behind for that first leg of the mountain. But, alas, she too began to slow...and slow even more...until Daddy and the stroller caught back up with us. Then we began the bribery with her...if she could make it all the way to the top of the mountain by walking by herself, she would get the largest, tastiest ice cream cone she's ever seen. That worked for about 10.8 seconds. Then Judson walked for a bit while she and Caleb rode. Though he gave it his best shot, his short legs and limited oxygen level soon had him ready to ride again. It gets a bit fuzzy from here, but the rest went something like this: we would somehow manage to bribe one of them out of the stroller so the free-walking (and inevitably tired and whiney) child could ride again, until that walking child too was ready to ride again. At one point, Tony, in an attempt to keep Caleb interested in walking, turned on the Imperial March on his cell phone. So, yes, if you were at Kennesaw Mountain on that particular day, we were the family slowing marching up the mountain to Darth Vader's theme song. I'm certain we frightened a few families visiting our country from foreign lands...
It even devolved so much that for the last stretch of the mountain (which seemed like the last half a mile) one of us was carrying one of them while the other pushed the other two in the stroller. (On the bright side, what I thought would be an easy walk up the mountain turned into a serious workout.) It may have crossed our minds that we should just turn around and call it quits, but I refused. I was going to show them the meaning of perseverance - even if it meant that we would be a sweaty, grumpy, hot mess by the time we made it to the top. And I wanted to show them the great view from the top...the sweet reward at the end of our hard work.
And we did it. Not without sweat and tears, but we did eventually make it to the top.
Now it took us about an hour to get to the top, and we knew that there was no way our kids would suffer another hour to get to the bottom. To shorten the ride down, we came up with an innovative (though perhaps not quite as safe) way to transport all three kids in the one stroller...
(I can assure you that Tony had a firm grip on Juddy at all times.)
Once everyone was in place, we kicked into high gear and ran to the bottom. Whatever time we lost on the way up, we made up for on the way down. We may have received some strange looks and comments on the way down, but there was at least no crying or whining all the way down. While no one earned a giant ice cream cone (well, at least none of the children), we all had a small bowl of ice cream when we got home to reward them for hanging with us on this adventure.
It may have turned into more of a feat than I had anticipated, but we left with the pride of knowing that we had made it, despite serious adversity (i.e., three cantankerous children). And my quads were a little sore the next day from the downhill run. I would call that a win-win. Though next time (and every time after that until our kids learn to walk the whole way) we will most certainly bring the second stroller with us.
