Best hike ever

Brian and I love hiking. Especially together, we work like a well oiled machine and its the best couples therapy/bonding time. We have been very lucky to go on two hikes together this summer thanks to our amazing families who jump in and help watch the girls for us.
I'm not going to lie, leading up to the hikes I start thinking, "Why are we hiking? We should just go to a hotel and do nothing for two days." But once we get out there it's so much fun I remember why we do it.

The Timberline hike is a hike around Mt. Hood and part of it meets up with the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT) which goes from Mexico to Canada. This was Brian's 4th year and my second, Craig and Jess came again and some new hiking friends, Kirk and Amy. We hadn't hiked with Kirk and Amy before so there was a little unknown about how well we would all do together. About 2 hours in it was clear we had an amazing group. We all got along amazing and had the best team work through river crossings and setting up camp each night. We had such an amazing time and everyone had such a good sense of humor that even on the hard inclines we were able to laugh through the pain.

The very beginning before we started, all ready to go

We joked about how we jumped a couple levels in friendship with Kirk and Amy. We went from talking at tailgators together to bathing in streams in our underwear together. Hey, when you are hiking for 4 days, a bath in the freezing water in your underwear is heavenly.
Each day brought different terrain and challenges and it was such a fun adventure. One day we ended up going past the camp spot we had originally planned on and did 16 miles in one day. That was definitely our toughest day and by the time we put our tents up we all needed major pain pills. Once those kicked in we all felt a lot better :)
Some highlights of our best hike ever:

Playing Cards Against Humanity

Bathing in the creek

Food and Beer halfway through at Timberline Lodge

The amazing views where the only thing you could think to say was, "Wow, look at that."

At the Lodge, halfway through our journey

Kirk and Brian climbing out of Elliott

Kirk and Amy by the sign that says, do not cross Elliott, we are rebels

snow crossings

One of the many amazing views

The waterfalls are amazing

Spectacular views around every bend

River crossings

Being silly

The guys

 One of the most spectacular waterfalls ever is Ramona Falls, it cannot be fully captured by a picture. It's just incredible in size and all the different rocks make the water cascade so beautifully all the way down.

Ramona Falls

I would highly recommend this hike. It's about 40 miles so doing it in 4 days is more than doable. There are some tough inclines and terrains in general but the views and accomplishment are worth it.