Chapter 5

STEP STEP. Stepstepstepstep. I was sweating and panting in about three minutes.

Mom sang her hiking song to keep me going:

“I think mountain hiking is not to my liking,

It’s not just like climbing up stairs.

It takes a lot longer,
your legs must be stronger,

And mountains are loaded with bears!”

After about an hour (which seemed like a million years), we stopped for a break.

We were in a meadow that was full of blue flowers and butterflies rushing around. Dad gave each of us a hunk of chocolate from this big, melty bar he carried.

“Don’t eat too fast or you’ll barf.” Jenna licked her chocolate carefully.

“Blaaaaahhhhh!” Jack fake-barfed just to be annoying.

Mom sang her chocolate song:

“Spinach may be full of vitamin E,

But of all vegetables, be suspicious.

For lettuce will lure you,

And carrots will cure you,

But chocolate is much more delicious!”

There was a stream that cut the meadow in half.

“Hey, let’s go stream swimming!” I said to Jack.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah!” Jack started to get undressed. See, we usually go stream swimming in our underpants, and carry extras to change into after. Of course, if anyone else had been around, like Pete Landon (yikes!) or Flip Bimstein (ick!), I’d never go swimming in my UNDERPANTS . But it was just us, so who cares.

But right when we got our toes wet, a bunch of clouds showed up, moving fast. ZIP, they covered the sun. We put our pants back on and pulled out our jackets.

Jack pretended he was Dad. “Saddle the horses! Up and at ’em!”

Jenna rolled her eyeballs.

We climbed higher, really high.