Catch 22

Ilise being goofy with the discs that Steph gave her. One is Be Kind, Rewind and the other is Kung Fu Panda. Jack Black marathon I guess. This is taking place on the car ride to Turkey Run. Our original plans were to visit Char in Indy and go ice skating until she got the flu. Ilise seemed depressed after hearing this so I mentioned we could always go skating in west lafayette by the levy. She turned down every other birthday activity I mentioned so I finally decided to try something that I wanted to do, fully expecting her to say no. The weather has been awesome over the last few days and I had been wanting to take advantage of it. Ilise loved the idea. She admitted that she had the idea in her head but wanted me to read her mind rather than have to tell me what she wanted to do on her birthday. I love how women think ;) or at least my wife. We invited Charlie to come and later invited Steph after she woke us up at 8 on Saturday morning to wish Ilise Happy Birthday.

View of the river from the big suspension bridge. This is the first time I have seen the river iced over. All of the ice definately made for an interesting day. I figured that since we had had 40-50 degree weather for the last few days there would not be any snow or ice, just lots of water. I was very wrong.

Giant snowball in the middle of the river

This is our favorite rock. The first picture we took of us on it had light shining down directly over top of us. The shot was amazing. Ever since then, we have taken pictures every time we see it.

Icy canyon. When I said the ice made things interesting, this is what I meant. Climbing a canyon that is covered in ice proved to be difficult. Several times we had to help each other to make it up. On one occassion, Steph slipped and nearly went for a long slide but Charlie and I grabbed her after sliding a couple feet. Her hands were numb for the rest of the hike.

Ilise posing in front of the frozen waterfall in the Punchbowl. Ilise's butt is wet because she too got to slide. Charlie Steph and I decided to take the low route along the river while Ilise wanted to be adventuresome and take the higher path. Everything was great until she got to the end and there was no way down except an icy portion of the hill or a rocky and snowy portion. She made it part way down and then fell and slid most of the remainder.

Ilise and Steph wanted to get a picture together because they had both fallen down on the ice already. Charlie and I had a great time. They kept hoping that we would fall but we remained dry throughout the hike.

Steph's hands after falling on the ice. They look just a bit red! She actually had tiny cuts on her fingers.

A comparison of Steph's hand to Ilise's hand.


A picture of us decending the latter. At this point, we were forced to abaondon trail 3 because there was just to much ice to make it to the next ladder safely. I still belive we could have done it had we all worked together and possibly had better shoes with tread or spikes. We had to detour to trail 5 instead which was very muddy and not as fun as the previous hike.


Emo Charlie possibly regretting letting us drag him along on the hike.

Once we got finished hiking we went to a Chinese buffet. We barely made it through the hiking due to hunger. We went shopping for a bit in Lafayette after leaving Turkey Run and then made our way back to our apartment to hang out for the rest of the day. Since I happened to have the necessary ingredients for curry, I was able to talk Steph into cooking it for us. Thanks Steph! She also volunteered to back Ilise's cake after seeing me pull out the mix because she knows how much I hate baking. Something to note in the picture above is the excellent distribution of candles in the cake done by Steph and Charlie.