Rock City...Mount Diablo Training Hike...

Will and Wyatt are planning on hiking the tallest mountain in the lower 48 states, Mount Whitney, in a few weeks.  Will got the idea at the end of the summer, registered for a permit and got to training.  Will invited his brothers.  Wyatt had a friend who hiked Whitney with his dad over the summer so Wyatt thought he'd give it a try too.  So, the guys have been trying to get in some training hikes before the big hike.  

Will and Wyatt conspired to get a hike up Mount Diablo in right after church today but the timing would be tight.  They would get to the top right at sunset and the park closes at sunset.  They would need a ride home.  So the other kids and I agreed to meet them for the sunset.  

Unfortunately, I've only been up Mount Diablo a couple of times.  I was under the impression that Rock City was the top of the mountain or where we would meet the guys.  I was wrong.  Turns out Rock City is barely halfway up the mountain...barely.  So the kids and I made it to Rock City in plenty of time.  I had no cell service and neither did Will so we parked the van and I let the kids scramble around on the rocks.  Periodically I'd shout out "WILL!  WYATT!" into the abyss to see if they were close.  

The kids had a blast on the rocks and we enjoyed a lovely sunset at Rock City.

After about 40 minutes of playing, I started to wonder about Will and Wyatt.  Somehow in our wanderings around Rock City, I got a bar or two of cell service and some texts from Will came in.  They guys were at the actual top of the mountain and the park rangers were threatening to kick them out.  We had 15 minutes to get to the top of the mountain to collect them.  It was dark, it was cold, the wind was whipping and we probably had a 25-minute drive up windy roads to collect the guys.

We piled into the van and raced up and around the mountain as fast as we could (safely).  We pulled up to the actual top at 7:04.  Will and Wyatt were waiting, shivering in the cold. 

It was a bit of a disaster but the guys got a training hike in...look for the positives, right?