48 Hours in the Poconos: Day 2 & Video Diary

Our second morning started bright and early. We enjoyed some free hotel breakfast and then hopped in the car to drive northwest to another waterfall-filled hike.

The morning looked gorgeous but again, clouds started to take over by the afternoon.

RICKETTS GLEN STATE PARK
There's no easy, direct route to this park; we spent a lot of time on little winding country roads. But, it's definitely worth a visit. It's a huge park with really decent amenities. There's picnic areas with grills, swimming, water sports, and miles and miles of hikes with gorgeous waterfalls. I really want to go back.

We ended up doing the Bear Walk Trail, a bit of the Falls Trail, and the Highland Trail.

The Bear Walk Trail was pleasant and easy but boring. It's missable but it was nice and quiet which meant GM could be off leash, which was enjoyable for him.

The park guide recommends hiking shoes (no sandals for sure) but I think sneakers were comfortable. That being said, we didn't do that aggressive of a hike and it wasn't that wet while we were there.

The first major waterfall we encountered was Onondaga.

The second waterfall was F.L. Ricketts, which is named after the daughter of the colonel that the park is named after.

The third waterfall we hit was Shawnee. At this point, we decided to turn around because we were getting hungry.

The picnic area is really nice because it's near the water so you can enjoy a lovely view whilst eating.

For lunch we had Icelandic-style hot dogs (which means they have crunchy onions and honey mustard).

After lunch, we hopped in the car for a short ride to another trail, which is also part of the park.

We were promised a grand view, per the name of the trail, but we didn't think much of it. We did see some guy who had trespassed into the fire tower and was climbing it and yelling down to his girlfriend saying that the view was spectacular so I guess the grand view is only for criminals and the park rangers who patrol the tower.

This trail was on the rougher side. Half of it was really easy and the other half was in brambles and rocks. This is a trail after which you need to check for ticks.

After our nine mile hike (my fitbit said I did 23,000 steps that day), we headed back to the hotel to rest. Mich and I headed down to the pool to sit in the hot tub so we could soothe our aching feet and muscles, which helped immensely.

For dinner, we made fish tacos (with broiled Chilean sea bass). It was really good and hit the spot.

And then after dinner, even though it was raining, we hit up a local joint for ice cream.

I had a choc-vanilla twist soft-serve dipped in chocolate.

After that, we had another early night (falling asleep to a Harry Potter marathon). We thought we might do another hike on Monday morning but it was raining pretty aggressively so we just headed home to hang out and relax.

It was such a fun weekend. I love hiking so much; it's enjoyable exercise.

Here's my video diary:

xoxo.