The Mighty Mississippi

I cannot spell "Mississippi" without chanting it out in the rhythm we learned in elementary school:

M-i-s-s-I-s-s-I-p-p-I!

Just a little useless trivia for you.

Everyone was excited to head to the Mississippi headwaters!  The kids thought it was awesome that we could walk across it. 

Let me say - those rocks are slippery.  Not mossy/slimy-slippery, just slippery. 

Kind of treacherous-slippery...

I watched those three head across first.  There were TONS of people trying to get by this little set of rocks and people were falling into the water or grabbing someone to keep from falling.  I just shot pictures.  The guy behind me dared me to go across the water with my camera.  Um. No.

Maddie and Jake were thrilled to make it across without falling in.  There was a little celebratory jump and high-five.

Then they walked down a little path on the other side of this stream/creek/river thing and walked across the bridge.

Much easier. 

The kids were excited when they realized I still wanted to walk across which meant they got to go again.

Surprisingly the water was not really chilly.  I expected extreme frigid temps.

We headed back down the path when we were through but decided to skip the bridge and walk across the mostly-sandy bottom that looked about mid-calf deep.

Except mid-calf for me and mid-calf for Jake are not the same.  There were a couple deeper spots that we didn't notice until too late.  The bottom of Jake's shorts retained a bit of water, but I don't think he minded.

But we, too, made it across without falling.

The kids were VERY excited when we told them they could head across by themselves. 

And despite the above pictures - still no one dropped in.

When we reviewed the whole trip, this was definitely the highlight for everyone!