Cheers to the 3-day weekend and I hope everyone enjoyed Labor Day!

On Friday, my sister-in-law Kim and I decided to get our butts back on trail, any trail, and we chose the Santa Paula Punch Bowl hike. If you don’t already know, we are avid hikers and at one point were hiking everyday and then of course life happened, then it got hotter than hell outside, annnnnnd fast forward a year and a half since we’ve been on an actual hike, let alone together. So this was so exciting for us!

I have seen a bit of people talking about the Santa Paula punch bowl hike for a while and really wanted to get out there and put feet to dirt and what better way than to see that cute waterfall at the bowl in the end. 

Be warned, if you’re anything like us (out of shape and apparently whiney bitches) the first mile to mile and a half is uphill along the paved street at the college. Yes, we had already died before we even reached the dirt. But it definitely made for a good laugh. After a false start, then getting on the right trail, we were on our way and I was stoked to already be crossing the cool creek early on in the hike. Clearly, I don’t get out much! 

A couple hiking duos flew passed us as we were taking in the view and then we continued on, following the colored arrows/marks along the rocks and trees that we had read about. We of course talked and laughed the whole way, taking in the pretty tree line and following the creek. 

The info I had on the trail said it was a 6-miler out and back, so we started to get a little worried as we approached 5 miles out and no sign of punchbowl or waterfall.

We turned around realizing even though we had been following the arrows we went the wrong way. And at this point there were some pretty sketchy routes. After we hiked almost 2 miles uphill the wrong way we back tracked to the last creek crossing so we could soak our feet and eat our lunch. What more of a beautiful place to do so. 

When we made it back to the crossing and in all of our dramatics we acted like we had been deprived of water, hootin’ and hollerin’ like ” WE WILL LIIIIIVE”. Was quite comical. 

Meanwhile, walking barefoot in the creek, the two duos that passed us both showed up from different directions. The two guys made it to the waterfall and punchbowl and were headed back the other couple took a wrong turn early on and had to double back following the right route. 

Even though we could have made it the last thirty minutes it was to the destination we decided not to because, well, kids at home and all that jazz. We headed back out after hanging out at the creek for about 35 minutes where we probably said every curse word under the moon, told each other our final good byes and to take care of each others children if either one of us don’t make it out, up that final damn hill and FINALLY the car! 

In all seriousness and ten miles later we were TIRED! 

But man it felt soooo good just to be out there again. From what I read we were expecting a lot more trash and graffiti but it didn’t bother us and there wasn’t much there anyway.

I would recommend this hike to anyone actually and can’t wait to go back with the kids and our men! I love hiking along side my sister because we get each other and its kind of our thing!

Everywhere is walking distance if you have the time. – Steven Wright

xoxo Walking Mama