Last week Reni and I had Tuesday off to make up for a parents’ observation day held on a previous Saturday. My original intention had been to spend the day with just Reni. As we arrived at the daycare centre to drop Syd off, I changed my mind. “Why shouldn’t Syd come along too? There’s no reason why not,” I thought to myself. So I went inside and notified the staff that Syd would be absent for the day.
The plan for the day was to head out to Aioi (Eye-Oi) in the mountains to play at a park, check out a museum and have a hot spring bath. We also would have a picnic lunch while we were out there.
After doing some shopping and preparing some sandwiches for lunch we set off. I’d been out to Aioi a few weeks previously to check out some waterfalls. It had taken about an hour to drive out there but that was bright and early in the morning when there was no traffic around. After navigating the congestion of the mid-morning city traffic it took us an extra half hour to reach our destination.
The park was on a mountainside at a campground. There were some pet rabbits in an enclosure near where we parked. Reni and Syd really enjoyed saying hello to them before we sat down to lunch. It was very peaceful while we ate. There was not a soul around, just the sound of chirping birds to keep us company.
After our tasty homemade bacon, egg and salad sandwiches we went off to play in the park. We’d brought Reni’s bike along for him to practice riding (without trainer wheels now). The steep hillside was not the most ideal place for it though and there was only a limited amount of flat ground available so we soon canned that idea.
We found some good climbing frames for the boys to play on. Reni climbed right to the top of one. (He’s become much more adventurous in his playing recently.) While I was keeping an eye on him Syd decided he’d like to try too. When I turned around he was also well above my head, much to my surprise. Our little ‘wild boar’ has very little idea of the concept of fear!
The climbing frames were connected by a flying fox. Reni was game to try it so I gave him a hand to ride it. After the first attempt he tried again by himself. He flew down the hillside into the ropes at the other end becoming entangled, laughing loudly nonetheless.
We explored some more of the park after climbing and discovered a long roller-slide complete with a spiral tunnel midway. The boys really enjoyed it. Unfortunately we did not have a lot of time to spare however so we had to make a choice between playing more or leaving for the onsen hot spring. Reni decided the latter so we headed off for a quick soak before the long drive back to the city where we had to pick up Yoko from work. Although we didn’t have time for the museum we still managed to fit in a picnic, a play and a wash for our fun day out in the mountains.
