RunSueRun

Tuscarora Trail

2009-07-03T18:02:00.000-07:00

Warning: Do not attempt to traverse this trail in summer months!

Preface: Ever since thru-hiking the granddaddy of long-distance hiking trails, the AT, 15 years ago, I've been intrigued by some of the shorter trails and have been knocking off one or two per year of late (see sidebar). The ability to cover many miles combined with, more importantly, Chris's willingness to crew have allowed me to complete some of these trails my preferred method--to say, much faster and lighter than the average backpacker. Except for the JMT in 2007, rather than attempting to break records, my goal has been one of seeing, enjoying, and experiencing the entire trail with none of it being done in the dark.
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The WHAT Trail? The Tuscarora Trail is a lightly used 250+ mile blue-blazed spur of the AT with both ends terminating at the AT--near Matthews Arm in Shenandoah National Park on the southern end, and at Darlington Shelter, near Carlisle, Pennsylvania, in the north, making a nice arc through sections of West Virginia and Maryland along the way. The TT is probably best known for its rocks--rocks that make all other "rocky" trails I've traversed, including the PA section of AT and the Massanutten 100 course, look like child's play. In the 1980s the PA section especially suffered from a terrible gypsy moth infestation which killed much of the surrounding trees, making way for a summertime onslaught of briars, brambles, and poison ivy, nearly closing the trail for good. Thanks to countless hours of volunteer labor, the trail was reopened in the mid 1990s. At least that's what I read.
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Thwarted once: In April 2008 I attempted to traverse the entire TT but due to sickness bailed early on Day 2, making it only 60'ish miles to Route 55. Fast forward 14 months to June 27. Chris and I are once again at the Rt. 55 TT crossing, well rested after spending the night at the charmingly funky See's Motel in Wardensville, WV ($45/night, cash only please!). I cross the road and proceed north, promptly losing the trail within the first mile. Shortly the correct route--my lifeline of blue blazes--is discovered and I continue onward. This losing-regaining the trail will become a frequent occurrence. Being low-tech, I do not use a GPS; rather the Ziplocked guidebook directions and map for each particular day never leave my hands. Fortunately, I seem to be able to sniff out the trail pretty well so never get very far off course. I have to admit, however, that the TT was a rather special challenge in spots!

Fueled by Sheetz! Each of the five days it took to complete the trail started at daybreak, usually after stopping at a local Sheetz for breakfast sandwiches (and "sheety" coffee), with Chris parking at most of the road crossings and backtracking to intercept me, thereby getting in a few miles himself. Frustratingly, we were never able to go as fast as we'd have liked, hardly making 3 mph most of the time. This trail is rugged! Much of the time there was no real treadway, just blue blazes through a forest littered with tree branches, blowdown, and rocks. Further north those impediments were hidden by the veritable jungle of weeds mentioned above. I began to really look forward to the road sections of which there were a few. Below is a very nice section of trail. If only I'd known what was ahead...

Where the wild things--but no humans--are: I saw lots of wildlife, probably due to the lack of both hikers and, for the most part, encroaching development. A couple of miles into the trek, I met a black bear who promptly skedaddled after I shouted "MOVE ALONG, BEAR!" :) I encountered dozens of deer, four porcupines, a few turkeys, and almost stepped on a big fat rattlesnake. The absence of other trail users was surprising: except for one man walking the eight-mile stretch of C&O Canal, I saw absolutely no one on the entire trail.

Brambles and briars and poison ivy, oh my! As I slowly picked my way across Pennsylvania's Tuscarora Mountain Ridge, the ubiquitous briars waged a full-on attack making my poor legs appear as though they'd been caught in the middle of a cat fight. Teasing respites here and there kept me optimistic: maybe the worst was behind me. But it never was. The f*cking briars continued all the way to the northern terminus. This optimism turned into a bordering-on-the-humorously-psychotic "IS THAT ALL YOU CAN THROW AT ME TUSCARORA TRAIL?! I *WILL* FINISH THIS TRAIL BECAUSE I AM ONE TOUGH MF'er!!" mentality. Here's what I'm talkin' about:

Trauma: Yes, that is the "trail." Yes, those are thorny green things. Yes, there is a blaze hidden in there somewhere. And it went on for miles and miles and miles. Oh yeah, and all that plant life covered all the rocks. There were a lot of rocks. I'm kinda proud of the fact that I fell just once (gotta take the small victories). There were also a lot of ticks. And spider webs, the ones that are all at face level. Since there was no one else on the trail, I got to break ALL of 'em. As of this writing a few days after finishing, the scratches are healing but the poison ivy is just now making its full wrath known.

A religious experience: On Day 4 I climbed Knob Mtn., another long, rocky, bramble-infested PA ridge culminating in a, well... rocky KNOB. As I topped out on the ridge, the skies darkened ominously and began rumbling. Round 1 began around noontime, complete with lightning and a torrential downpour. "Well that was fun" thought I; since it hardly ever rains in CA, experiencing it is kind of novel. Round 2 was a bit more intense, but I happened upon an overhanging slab of rock in the escarpment just in time to avoid a good pelting with marble-sized hail, laughing out loud at the ridiculousness of the situation. Yes, I do know you're not supposed to hide under a rock during a lightning storm, but it made for a better religious experience.

Dark thoughts: My circa 1997 TT guidebooks (there are two) mention only one shelter on the entire trail; however, I saw six or seven of the beautiful structures, including two currently being built. As I fought the overgrowth and stumbled over the sharp rocks (both loose and stable), I wondered why so much time, effort, and money was going toward building shelters rather than maintaining the trail. Were they taking the "If we build it, they will come" approach? Why did the PATC/KTA not post the many trail relocations on their websites? Why didn't more people care about this route, one that has the potential to be a gem of a long-distance trail?

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Happy thoughts: Encounters with the previously mentioned wildlife, beautiful songbirds, wildflowers, ferns, solitude (especially for an introvert who loves getting inside her head), pastoral farm scenes, wonderfully intense smells of a humid forest, and really nice local people produced happy thoughts. The nice people include the proprietors of See's, Pikeside, Jimmy's, and Kenmar motels, the 5 a.m. Sheetz employees, the WV dude in the beatup truck who advised Chris to "not let yer wife run alone in these parts," and State Forest worker "Ed" (below), with whom we spent 20 minutes chatting. (Note map & directions in hand.)

Final thoughts: The Tuscarora is one of the most difficult trails I've ever attempted, but most of the difficulty was due to the summertime overgrowth and apparent lack of maintenance on long stretches of trail. Perhaps because of a particularly wet spring the growth was excessive this year. If I knew then what I know now, I would attempt this trail only in the springtime, before the briars have taken over. Then it probably would be pretty nice. Am I glad I did it? Of course. Sections of the Tuscarora Trail were lovely, and with a s***load of TLC this trail could be a winner. The good outweighed the bad, and I never resorted to tears (did get close a couple of times!). Oh wait, Chris wants to say something...

Crew note: Sue is still delirious from her adventure. There IS no trail -- just a marginally progressive display of blue blazes strewn among trees requiring the hiker (not runner, as Sue's notes would allude to the absence of opportunity to do) to sustain constant mental acuity in order to get the sense of forward motion towards some long-distant end point. Still, the beasties were pretty cool...

Laurel Highlands

2009-06-15T07:43:00.000-07:00

I spent Saturday, June 13, running one of the most beautiful ultra courses in the country, the Laurel Highlands 70 miler. Traversing the entire length of the trail, from Ohiopyle to near Johnstown, Pennsylvania, each mile is marked with a ~two-foot-high concrete obelisk. Laurel is a 30-year-old ultra event which due to its then 18-hour cutoff and no aid stations (each runner was required to have her own crew), previously attracted mainly the grizzled hardcore and/or faster runners. A few years back, fully stocked and manned aid stations were added along with an extended cutoff of 22 hours, making for a much higher finish rate. Most of the time you are running on bike- and horse-free singletrack through beautiful hardwood forests, the ground absolutely covered with ferns, interspersed with a few sections of rainforest/jungle-like rhododendrun groves and a short dirt road section leading to the Mile 62 aid station.

Having run just one event on the East Coast in over three years, Laurel was a special treat for me. Compared to the arid West, there is so much beautiful green. And the birds! I heard hermit thrushes, wood thrushes, veeries, ovenbirds, the squeeky-wheel bird, and the "Here I am... where are you?... here I am... where are you?" one (names escape me), all the birds I used to hear on my runs in Vermont. It was a wonderful day of running through the woods. :)

As for my "race," I'm satisfied with my time and performance (15:44) even though it was 1:18 off my best--and only other--Laurel of 14:26, seven years ago. The last two weeks were spent fighting a cold and nagging cough, and we were a wee bit jetlagged after flying into Dulles Friday evening and driving four hours to the start. Then I nearly missed the start! Thinking the race started at 6 a.m., we showed up around 5:15. I didn't realize the race started at 5:30 until I heard "5 minutes to start!!" and didn't even have my running shoes on yet. Doh!

The early miles felt humid but cool, and fortunately it never got hot. By Mile 6, I'd already decided it was going to be an enjoy-the-day race, coughing & hacking my way down the trail and having a hard time getting into a good groove. No worries; if nothing else, it would be great training for upcoming summer adventures. At the first aid station, I mumbled something to Chris, crew extraordinaire, about being prepared for a long day. It was fun chatting away the miles while running with Stuart Kern and especially David "I-just-ran-OD-last-weekend" Snipes, with whom I ran about 40 miles. My frequent outbursts of "Look at all these ferns!!" and "Do you know what kind of bird that is? It's an ovenbird! How cool is that?!" were probably getting annoying, but I was so enjoying the surroundings. By the halfway point, I finally felt like I was hittin' a groove and was able to dig in, running consistently and with pretty even splits, passing about a dozen people along the way. Chris ran backwards from the finish line to meet me around Mile 66, bringing lights and a Starbucks Doubleshot and telling me all about the adventures of his day, so the last four miles passed rather quickly. We ran without the lights until about a mile before the finish line, which I finally crossed at 9:14 p.m., third woman and first master, collecting my second wooden obelisk mile-marker replica. (I have a ways to go to catch up with Chris's SIX!)

Laurel is a truly great event, one of the originals. If you haven't yet run it, you owe it to yourself to do so. It's even worth a plane ride cross country!!

Born to Run

2009-05-23T20:12:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago in Denver we checked out a reading/author's signing of ChristopherMcDougall's recently published Born to Run. After a brief but entertaining discussion, we dutifully grabbed a copy (nice cover photo by Luis Escobar!) and stood in line for autographing. As the wait approached 15, then 20 minutes, our impatience invited bagging the whole signing thing--and the book--until... Whoa! What do we have here on page 137? Why, the author mentions Chris's legendary Coyote Fourplay!! Cool. Of course, legends aren't necessarily totally factual: to Chris's knowledge, no one ever replaced a ProBar with frozen cat food. :)

I had a couple of other books to finish first so am only on Chapter 4 but look forward to delving into this baby. After its first week, Born to Run was 31 on the NY Times Bestseller List, and this week it's 24. Will this book do for ultrarunning then again what Dean Karnazes's book did?

Bishop High Sierra Ultras

2009-05-19T17:10:00.000-07:00

What the heck is that? That, my friends, is a banana and tapioca quesadilla. And THAT is just one of many taste sensations awaiting your palate at the Sage Summit aid station, had you run the Bishop 100k on Saturday. (You didn't eat the "carne asada" dip, though, DID YOU?!) This was the merry band of jokesters we 100k runners encountered at Miles 52 and 57. Think I may have a good idea who the instigator was...

This was the first year for the 100k option, the other distances being 20 miles, 50k, and 50 miles. Having never before run Bishop OR a 100k (in 17 years of ultrarunning!), I decided to go for the Full Monty and wasn't disappointed. It got hot--in the mid 90s--but the full brunt of the heat wasn't really felt until the descent back to the valley; higher up, nice breezes, cooler temps, and first-rate aid stations kept things pleasant. It was fun seeing old friends on the two separate out-and-backs, and the high Sierra scenery was spectacular (although upon reaching the high point of about 9,400 feet, I wanted to keep trekking toward the mountains!).

At Mile 48.5 the 100k runners could follow the course directly, and mostly gently downhill, back to the finish and get credit for a 50-mile finish. A LOT of 100k'ers--like half the field of ~80--called it a day and did just that. Option #2 was to continue on the 100k course. But this was not just 12 additional miles: this was 12 additional miles and LOTS of climbing, about 2000 feet worth in two separate ascents. What the...?! At the top of the first ascent we were greeted by the merry band and victuals pictured above. From there, we dropped a (okay, I'm embellishing, but it seemed really long) Hardrock-like descent (reminded me of Oscar's Pass minus the bowling ball sized rocks), to the "Poker Chip Turnaround." Then we got to retrace our steps ALL the way back to that 48.5 aid station and from there, to the finish.

Lucky for me, buddy Ken Hughes caught up to me at Sage Summit #1, so we ran the remaining 10 miles together, filling those hours with nonstop chatter. I'd basically been running alone all day, so this was fun! We crossed the finish line together in 14:08, good for 10th place overall, and 2nd chick for me. Marie Boyd definitely has a winner in the Bishop 100k, so hope it's here to stay!

Bishop High Sierra website

More CO photos

2009-05-18T17:40:00.000-07:00

LQQK, it's the C2M Buffoon enjoying the sun in Fruita!
Zippity Do Da, zippity day...
We hiked partway up Pikes Peak to Barr Camp, where we enjoyed a long chat with Theresa, the caretaker for the past 4 years. She and her husband Neal are ultrarunners--she ran Rocky this year, and he does Hardrock. They live and train at 10,200 feet!!
This was on the Waldo Canyon loop, near C. Springs. Ouch.
And our destinations keep getting colder. This is Trail Ridge Road in Rocky Mtn. National Park, on May 10. They try to get the road completely open by Memorial Day weekend.

Rattlesnake Arches hike

2009-05-18T17:22:00.001-07:00

Finally home & finally downloaded photos. These are from the Rattlesnake Arches hike near Colorado National Monument. Here we were cairn embellishing:

This little fellow was beautiful! We got a bunch of shots of him.
Like being in a big lobster claw. NOOooooo, don't close!! :)
A little rock climbing:
Success. Now for the hard part:

Running Fruita

2009-05-04T07:18:00.000-07:00

OM...

Keeping watch:

You know you've found a great outdoors playground when you visit a place you're loathe to leave. Places like Silverton, Bishop, and Stehekin quickly come to mind. Such was the case with a recent serendipitous sojourn to Fruita, Colorado. With a few free days on the front end of a work trip to Denver, too much snow in the higher country, and no clear plan (yeah! in my book perhaps the #1 ingredient for a great trip), the warmer temps of canyon country beckoned this wimpy Vermonter turned SoCal sun lover. I liked the place enough to add it to my ever lengthening list of "Places I'd Like to Live for a Year."

Fruita, a few miles west of Grand Junction, is more commonly known as a mountain biker's destination, but the awesome singletrack makes for some splendid trailrunning as well. Trailrunners have, of course, discovered Fruita: it is the home of the Spring Desert ultras. But I've never really heard runners talk about its being a great running destination... especially in springtime... especially if you're coming off 4-6 months in the frozen hinterlands. With the small town of Fruita as the hub, trail systems surround the area, most notably the Kokopelli, 18 Road, Rabbit Valley, and Lunch Loop trail systems, with the Pollock Bench area set aside for foot travel only. There are MILES 'n MILES of trails here!! For an epic run, one can go all the way to Moab via the 140-mile Kokopelli Trail. For a really epic run, she could continue to Montrose via the Paradox Trail and from there back to Grand Junction on the Tabeguache Trail, for a grand total of about 385 miles. Anyone ever run it?? Hmm...

There's also great road running and riding, specifically 23-mile-long Rim Rock Drive through the fabulous rock formations of Colorado National Monument.

With only four days to kill--barely enough time to scratch the surface--we experienced a good sampling of what the area has to offer. The first day was a 7 miler through Flume Canyon followed by fluid & electrolyte replacement at Pancho's Villa. The waitress was a pro: "I hope these aren't too strong." Riiight...

Day #2 was a 15-mile jaunt across some of the Kokopelli trails: Moore Fun, Mary's Loop, and Horsethief Mesa, where all the mountain bikers we met were friendly and courteous. Likewise, we were quick to smile and jump off the singletrack so they could quickly pass. We ended the day with a drive through Colorado National Monument.

On the third day Chris wanted to check out Rattlesnake Arches (photo at top, more to follow), the second largest collection of arches in the country after the ones near Moab. The shortest access is a 4-5 mile hike via a 4WD road, but our PT Cruiser rental necessitated the longer 13-14 mile round trip schlep across the Pollock Bench Trail, "bench" being a bit of a misnomer since we had to descend & ascend 4 separate little canyons to get to Rattlesnake Arches Trail proper. Surprisingly (remember, I don't always do well with planning), this included a bit of Class 3-4 scrambling in a couple of spots. The arches were spectacular and in a very peaceful and remote setting, 8 arches along the trail and reportedly many more off trail. Upon reaching the end of the maintained trail, one could either backtrack or take the more, uh, adventurous shortcut through Rainbow Arch, cutting off about a mile. I opted for the shortcut. This Youtube link probably describes the route better than I am able. This little friction climb would've been nothing for a rock climber, but I'm not so it was a little bit scary... not one of the smarter things I've ever done but wicked fun just the same. :) After photo-documenting my stupidity, Chris wisely chose to retrace his steps and we regrouped at the trail junction for the long slog back to the car. That night we craved beer, fat & salt so decided on pizza at the Hot Tomato Cafe, where we lucked out, hitting $2 Fat Tire draft (1554, yum) and live entertainment night! The pizza was to die for...

On our final day, we decided to check out the 18 Road area north of town for a quick morning workout. I couldn't resist "Zippity Do Da" and "Chutes 'n Ladders." Wheeeeeee... these trails rock! Because of an upcoming date in drizzly, cold C. Springs, sadly we had to hit the road. We will definitely be back. I may even bring my mountain bike...

Leona Divide 50 !!

2009-04-20T19:02:00.000-07:00

He said/She said

Jan 1st: "Hey, Honey, let's do Leona Divide!! I'm out of shape, need to get in shape, and need a target. They have an Old Farts' 28 miler, but I'm going for the 50!"

What Chris fails to mention is that being in constant atrial fibrillation for the past four years has prevented him from entertaining the thought of really running, to say nothing of entering an ultra. Four cardioversions, two ablations, and (finally!) the optimal medication dosage has enabled him to once again feed his addiction of 30 years. (Any '78 Pepsi Tahoe runners out there??)

What Sue fails to mention is my not-so-subtle encouragement for her to rekindle her own interest in the sport, that having taken a detour over the last couple years while she discovered long trails out West (yes, she still has the overall JMT supported speed record). So, I needed to find out if the ticker could handle a "real" ultra again, and I wanted her company (as always) for the adventure that involved. Check's in the mail for Suz Johnston and EuDene Keezleburger...

We start training... or at least the Scott/Johnston version of "training," which is #1 unorthodox (or "freeform" if you like), and #2 fun, starting off with my running the Ouachita Trail in January, a handful of 20 milers in Point Mugu State Park, a couple of Mark Wieneke Sespe Wilderness blood-letting adventure runs, a Grand Canyon R2R2R, many hours on the elliptical trainer & yoga sessions (Sue) and lap swimming (Chris) at the Y, and many, many Ray Miller loops.

All told, much more running for Sue (e.g., Ouachita) than I, so ratio of hiking to running is about 70:30. Not the kind of base one would expect to produce a sub-9 hour Leona. Operative question: does a 16 hour R2R2R equate to a 13 hour Leona? I'm about to find out... Here we are at the start: Jack Fierstadt, Justin Monast, me and Sue. (photo by H'ard Cohen)

Before the start, fellow Venturian Kim Abundis asks what kind of time I'm shooting for. My response is something like, "Well, in my day (haha) I would hope to break 9 hours, but I'm just not sure what's going to happen out there today. I want to finish, and I don't want it to turn into a death march." I have no splits, time goals, or "plan"... then again, even in more competitive days I always ran by feel and not by my watch. That freeform thing again...

Watch? How the hell is a watch going to get me off the course any faster? As the Beatles noted, I'll just follow the sun. Trudging up the first hill at 6AM, not in any hurry to see the sun, anticipating it will only roast my (rhymes with putz) later...

Trudging? I run all the way up that f*cker!! Feeling great in the first few miles and knowing that it will get toasty later, I try to get miles in the bank early while temps are still in the 40s and 50s. By the first aid station at Mile 8, off come the long-sleeve shirt and gloves. Then we're on the "new" section of the course. (Of course having never run Leona before, it's all new to me.) Apparently the old course traversed mostly singletrack trail in the next section, while the new course does a bit of singletrack PCT before a long 12-mile out and back on a gravel fire road with quite a bit of elevation loss and gain. I actually enjoy this section: the trees, plants, animals are obviously different, but the surface reminds me of my old dirt roads in Vermont.

Ugh, 12 exposed miles of dirt road, with dust, more dust, and still more dust as the sun rises in the sky and signals how toasty today will be. Gosh, my favorite conditions!! One bright spot: as I'm still trudging toward the turn around point (way the flock out to nowhere), here comes Sue returning from same, chipper as if she were on her Vermont roads. After the turnaround (in the flocking middle of nowhere), it's more trudging -- with dust and niggling little rocks in my shoes -- back to the "old course" and the promise of trail.

And what a fun piece of trail it is! Four miles of smooth downhill on the PCT to the Mile 28 aid station. Whheeeeeee! I turn on my music for a dose of female empowerment--Ani DiFranco yeah!--for the long climb ahead and humor myself by spotting runners ahead and trying to catch them. Final count from miles 25-50 is a dozen, all guys. The 7 women ahead of me, especially Krissy Moehl (wow!), look very strong.

On that same downhill, Rick Hodges, dressed like he's just hiking, spends only as much time as needed to let me know this is the longest he's run since last year's Hardrock (we're just past Mile 24). 'Bye, Rick, have a great day!! OK, he's tough, I'm a flippin' wimp. Once across the road after Mile 28, that first mile is relentless (at least for a wimp -- I stop more than once because of light headedness, a younger dude in front of me turns around back to the A/S) and I'm thinking I'll turn around at the next station. My (rhymes with putz) are over an open flame now...

After a bunch of "Good jobs!" to everyone I meet on the trail, I reach the turnaround at mile 35 and catch Ken Hughes, who makes a comment about not being able to shake me (hee hee). It is getting a little warmer, not terribly so--I think it feels great--but can't pass up an orange popsicle at the next aid station. Yum-O! A few minutes later I meet Chris, who looks good (Chris always looks good) albeit not quite as cheery as on the first out and back. I share my ice water and tell him about the popsicles ahead. Soon afterward I meet Rock Star Leigh Corbin: "Hey, you should catch up to Chris. He could use your encouragement to get to the finish!" I cruise the beautiful singletrack all the way down to the mile 28 aid station which is now, thankfully, mile 42, drop my Nathan pack in favor of a handheld bottle, and start up the last climb.

Well, of course, it's not hot for you!! You're coming DOWN hill while I'm on (rhymes with putz)-roasting UP hill. But, yes, the popsicles (all 3 flavors -- they felt sorry for me), beer, and chips 'n salsa at the Aloha station boost me enough to actually think of finishing this cooker. (Did I mention the dust already?) Leigh DOES catch me at the furthest aid station; leaves before me (just one more gulp of Dew); and I vow to stay close to her for as long as my dust/niggling rock-invaded shoes will allow. More beer & popsicle at Aloha, but gotta press, cuz now cutoffs have become an issue (at least in Leigh's mind and on her watch which I don't have one of; I'm oblivious but keep her optimistic (meaning, I lie)).

The climb from miles 42 to 46 would be completely runnable were I fresh. Alas, I am not fresh. Hmm... maybe it IS just a tad bit warm out here. And darn if I didn't preload the handheld with Perpetuem when all I really want at this point is ice water. Just have to suck it up and mostly power walk up this thing. I keep seeing two guys ahead of me on the switchbacks but don't seem to make any progress in catching them until the final aid station. From there it's another half mile of climbing followed by about 3 miles of downhill to the finish. I pass the two switchbackers, plus a poor soul emptying the contents of his stomach with only a mile to go. Soon I hear cheering. Yay, the finish line!! My time is 9:22:19, good for 28th overall. Knowing that Jennifer Henderson was ahead of me, I'm confused when the RD hands me the awesome Women's 40-49 first-place trophy. "But what about Jennifer..." I ask. "She's 50." Gulp. Way to go Jennifer!

Let's see... 9:22 is 3:22, we're dipsy-doodling the rollers after Aloha (Mile 38), the sun still a scorcher (tho Leigh's like Sue -- heat-impervious). Mile 42 & 46 stations, ahead of cutoffs by 20 & 15 minutes, but the finishing miles arguably in question -- the map says one thing (4.5 to finish), the aid folks say something else (an easy 3.9, yeah, right!!), what's a lamebrain to think? Oooh, maybe we could be DFL Royalty? Let's slow down. (wtf??? you idiot, finish!!) At least the (rhymes with putz)-roasting sun is no longer a factor (but once roasted, is there regression back to life?). Two others finish after us, so we're D(Almost)FL Royalty, tho my head's light again, my feet are trashed, I couldn't hold a conversation with a praying mantis right now, got a beer? OK, soup will do. Let's go home and ponder Laurel Highlands...

What Chris fails to mention is that he and Leigh crossed the finish line in 12:43:43 (16 minutes to spare!), just shy of double his 50 mile PR (any '84 Half Moon Bay Fat Assers out there?) of 6:24. YOU ROCK, CHRIS!!! :) But Laurel Highlands?! Are you... (rhymes with putz)??!!

(Above photo by H'ard, below--Leigh and Chris finishing--by George Velasquez)

Channel Islands National Park

2009-04-12T18:56:00.000-07:00

Chris and I decided to finally visit the national park that sits right in our back yard. That would be Channel Islands National Park which encompasses five (of eight) islands: Anacapa, Santa Rosa, San Miguel, Santa Barbara, and the one we visited, Santa Cruz, the largest at 96 square miles. We were deposited at Scorpion Anchorage (below) by Island Packers on Thursday morning and walked the flat 1/2 mile past the old Scorpion Ranch to the Park campground, our home for the next two nights. In this photo Anacapa Island is visible in the upper left corner:

Like the better known Galapagos Islands of South America, Channel Islands' isolation has allowed evolution to proceed independent of the mainland. Eight plant species and one bird, the island scrub jay, are known only to Santa Cruz Island. The island fox, which wouldn't stand still for a photograph--we saw about a half dozen--lives only on the Channel Islands and is making a great comeback after numbering in the double digits in 1994!

The topography of Santa Cruz is remarkably diverse with grasslands, rocky mountain ranges (high point 2000+ ft.), pine forests, chaparral, and 77 miles of jagged coastline, with lots of sea caves, tidepools, beaches, and solitude. With over 50 miles of accessible trails and old grassy ranch roads--and no cars!--the island is a runner's paradise. :)

Montanon Ridge was surprisingly rugged. The grassland above was only minutes away from this rocky scramble.

We crested the ridge, then took a well-worn herd path almost a mile to the summit. There was even a register up there!

Some of the grassier trails were mowed, a joy to run on.

It got into the 40s at night, hence the down jacket. Daytime temps were in the 60s. This is part of the two-mile scenic loop from the campground:

Crazy trees out of the Wizard of Oz!

Part of the fox recovery plan involved the controversial eradication of non-native feral pigs. We were told that about 8,000 of them were trapped and shot--both on the ground and "Palin style" from helicopters. The last pigs were killed as recently as October 2006. We found a Golden Eagle trap (?) on stilts, next to a piggie cemetery.

My, what big teeth you have...

Santa Cruz Island, cont.

2009-04-12T18:52:00.000-07:00

More island shots & vegetation representation. Cacti:

At different spots, the island reminded me of Scotland, Ireland, Newfoundland, the Maine coast, Wyoming, and the Flint Hills of Kansas!

Trying to be artsy:

Gorgeous green. :)

Hard to believe this is within 100 miles of about 15 million people.

Running here was pretty cool:

Signed junctions on the more popular trails:

I don't know what it is, but it's NOT a dandelion:

Blue dicks (stop laughing) were everywhere:

Don't know the name of this one, but I like it:

One of many, many fields of blue dicks:

This blossom is little bigger than a pencil eraser:

Grand Canyon Double Crossing

2009-03-29T11:26:00.000-07:00

On Friday, March 27, Chris and I did the double crossing of the Big Ditch, 45 miles and a bunch of elevation gain & loss. Hereafter is the newbie's R2R2R report, in Chris-Speak:

The carburetor had been flushed, working with a stronger fuel to oxygen blend, the training wheels were put aside, we’d taken a couple practice laps to test out the refurbished machinery, so it seemed only fitting to see what the parts would do on a real course – Rim2Rim2Rim. Question was, would the existing parts work well enough with the overhauled to call the day (OK, dark2dark trek, with the larger question being how much darkness on the back end) a success? With some parts somewhat in doubt – hey, at 60, one doesn’t take THAT much for granted, and while I’m too far removed from Methuselah’s 900+ years (how DID he feel at 759, anyway?), relativity of truth plays strongly when one pursues optimism – Sue and I separately guessed 18-20 hours not beyond reasonable expectations. Personally, I was dreaming of 13 hours, just to surprise the hell out of myself. No surprises, of course, but what dream doesn’t come without ‘em?
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Checking in at Bright Angel lodge the night before, the only doofus in shorts and Hawaiian shirt – weather forecast posted on the wall: high of 42, low of mid-20’s – blended in like a mauve ballroom gown amid an NRA convention of cami gun-toters. Sue commented later that REI could make a bundle, even with sacrificing 25 cents on the dollar for location rights, selling to the assembled throngs just itching to prove that hiking fashion does equate to trail savvy and survivability. Me, I had my 15 year old bladder vest (tan) that snapped at both sides (making the wearing of same at least a 5 person negotiation of manipulating fingers); almost matching rust Patagucci wool undershirt, the sleeves of which garbled around my wrist like the neck of a shar-pei, but proved oh-so soft when wiping my nose during the trek; lime green Patagucci silkweight LS shirt that screamed to any lurking mountain lion “don’t risk it, hot rod, you’ll only get gut-wrenching indigestion!”; sky-bluish base color, yellowish and red striped 20 year old New Balance running tights, the elastic of which had long ago passed its prime (see Methuselah above), with the drawstring about as useful as four handles on a shot glass, but provided ample opportunity throughout the next day for getting upper body work hitching the fabric back over my progressively more achingly stretched-out butt cheeks.
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So, in bed too late (after surfing TV channels that looked like a random progression – how does C-Span precede ABC when starting from “2,” when at home they’re at least 75 channels apart?), up too damn early (“it’s happy hour somewhere” didn’t quite cut it as logic pattern), it’s butt cold outside, room service forgot to bring our freshly brewed coffee and poached eggs on whole wheat toast. What an outrage!! Good news was, we could blitz from the lodge to S. Kaibab trail without even slowing down for each stop sign along the way. Woo-HOO!! what mavericks!! OK, the “run”… Dark when we started, ahead of the mules (likely enjoying their coffee in bed…), made it down to the potties just in time for a deposit (ain’t it weird how the soft rush of air from below almost soothes and ignores the other wafting from that nether darkness?), then continuing down under a starlit sky that refused to relinquish space for the sun. But push in it did, and the visually higher horizon broke into a dimly gray horizontal pencil line. Later, about 15 minutes from the river, we pocketed our lights, and cruised (cruised?) into Phantom Ranch with only a handful of overnight guests showing some sign of life (they, too, thrilling over freshly brewed coffee delivered to each tent flap – they and the mules just tick me off!!). Not having had the pleasure of poached eggs, we instead savored the unlikely but most welcome flavor of previous-day-cooked 3 cheese tortellini and vegetable potstickers. Yum-O!! (Truly, they were, and Sue’s brainchild culinary creativity just set a new standard for on-trail delights.) Pack the cold temp clothes, fill up with water, and we’re off up the canyon, first through the tight walls and four bridges of The Box, the canyon soon widening as we approached Ribbon Falls. (From Phantom, aside from 3 people at Cottonwood campground, we saw not a soul again until below Cottonwood on our return trip from the North Rim. Oh, such delicious solitude!!)
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I’d purposely not asked Sue about how much time we were consuming, relying mostly on the slowly rising sun to gauge relative progress. As long as the yellow ball stayed hidden behind high walls, I presumed we were still early in the day. Our general target – again, separately anticipated but not yet vocalized – was 3:30 back to Phantom, where we could at least decide then on whether or not to enjoy a beer, rather than have the decision made for us because the camp host had to retreat to the kitchen to prepare for the next morning’s menu of poached eggs on whole wheat toast and freshly brewed coffee… Fortunately, that deadline seemed many hours away, so we continued our rubber-necking-to-take-it-all-in ambling up the now long, shallow canyon.
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From the South Rim looking into the Bright Angel canyon – see, I’m confused, too, cuz I thought Bright Angel was only on the South Rim, not the whole length of visual territory on the other side behind Phantom Ranch – I’d always assumed one just continued straight up that long chute until one gradually ascended to the rim. Which one can do, though one is no longer on the named North Kaibab Trail. Amazing what a detailed, dotted trail map reveals. So, we hang a left across a bridge onto Roaring Spring Canyon and the North Kaibab Trail; take another short break to grab more water; then about 10 minutes later turn a broader corner to view water gushing out of the side of the mountain. From across the canyon, it certainly looked like some dudes had corked the mountain and framed their work in blending color concrete. The trail placard only told us what rock formations we were transitioning through, not why water was spewing from the rock wall a thousand feet up and cascading toward the canyon floor. So, where’s this nifty Roaring Springs, huh? That question unanswered, we continued, let’s see… oh, yes, up, but now on trail much narrower and showing off near vertical drops farther down than I cared to hang my head over the edge to gauge and wheeze about.
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Of course, as with any other Big Ditch hiking in the vertical, the millennial formations only continued to fascinate. Some rock carved (as John McPhee wrote, though certainly not his words alone, by “wind and water…”) horizontally, some more vertically, much twisted, most in varying hues of the same base, each layer begrudgingly yielding its personality to the kid next door. A couple spots where last night’s freeze draped icicles over ledges, the warming day scurrying water below the icy shield, clear drops arcing earthward in the light breeze, splattering on ice-laced rocks inviting an unwary step. We skirted wide around one ice fall, and hugged the wall as we inched behind another farther up (that same one reduced to mere water when we passed that spot in early afternoon’s direct sunlight). Images such as these bombarding us; or rather, we discovering them for every 1/10th of a mile consumed by our shoes.

As we neared the North Rim, shaded areas revealed lingering snow mounds, yielding previous hikers’ footsteps. At the Rim itself, snow spread equably around us. We gathered in the glistening, posed for our self-portrait, and began our descent to the canyon floor, in this reverse direction continuing to unveil still more wondrous natural sculpting. One diversion on the return – we ventured toward Ribbon Falls, to avoid that silly (and pointless) up and down on the main trail, which resulted in having to cross the Bright Angel Creek at just shy of knee depth. Thank you, Drymax Bob, for a product that let me ignore my feet for several more miles, despite the creek soaking!!
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We missed beer call at Phantom, and we weren’t even that close. (They were probably down to just Bud Light anyway…) So, finishing off the last of the potstickers and chasing with a Snickers – can you imagine drinking a beer with that combo? – we pushed onward, thinking we were racing sunlight that really didn’t give a flying burrito about our progress. But by moving determinedly, the slowly fading light still yielded an evening’s soft view of Garden Creek’s Spring growth, most noticeably red bud trees exploding their blossoms before the green of their leaves. Breath taking, simply breath taking.

One last fill up at Indian Garden, a few campers to ignore, a few deer to greet as we exited the camp, and we stretched toward the South Rim, making it about half a mile shy of the 1.5 Mile mark before finally, reluctantly donning headlamps. These beaming light different eyes returned yet another set farther up the trail. Between flat rocks of a manmade wall, two tiny, almost pinpoint eyes mirrored our lights. Pausing only to say “Hi, Herb, give our best to the wife and kids…” we tried to increase our tempo to reach the Rim, a couple lights from above signaling our proximity to the Finish Line.
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Once cresting, we excitedly, tho almost totally drained, walked to our cabin less than a football field distance away. Opening the door and feeling the room’s warmth, sandstone powder shoes were the first to dirty the floor, other clothes soon piling in a corner as we now focused on our primary target, this one finding voice early in the day – shower, put on clean clothes, and get to the bar to get a burger before the kitchen closed. Sitting in the bar, while some crusty baby boomer with reverse beret and gray beard entertained himself as cover for entertaining a handful of non-REI-gear-glittered patrons sat nearby, we savored our beer, found the burger adequate for the occasion, and high fived each other more than a couple times. Yeah, I think Methuselah probably did feel OK at 759…

An Uncomformity... of a different kind

2009-03-28T20:09:00.000-07:00

(Yes, the tights were trashed -- and I mean left-in-the-garbage trashed -- at Bright Angel Lodge upon our completion.)

Sabbitical over... for now anyway!

2009-03-23T08:22:00.000-07:00

Executive summary of what I've been up to the past few months:

September: Spent a week in Utah and Idaho climbing their high points, Kings and Borah, both nice peaks, a bit of fun scrambling on Borah's Chicken Out Ridge. A few days later flew to Minneapolis on a work trip (why yes, I DID visit the Mall of America) and squeezed in a drive waaay up north to hike Eagle Mountain, MN's HP. (Four to go now!) From there it was on to Vermont for a couple of weeks to visit family & friends amidst the fabulous annual foliage display and where, on a bit of a whim, I decided to do my favorite 50 miler, the VT50, for the 13th time. Considering the lack of real training, I was happy enough to eke out a 9:19, good enough for 5th woman and first master chick. This was my one and only ultra race of 2008!

October: A few days on either end of a work trip to Gallup, New Mexico allowed us to visit the Grand Canyon, where I did my second R2R2R run, also the spectacular Canyon de Chelly and Petrified Forest National Park of northeastern Arizona. Canyon de Chelly is one of the most beautiful places I've ever visited, kind of like Zion National Park but with only a tiny fraction of the tourists. With the exception of one trail, because it is on Navajo land, visitors must be accompanied by a guide in order to enter the canyon. Otherwise, they are relegated to the rim overlooks, which are nothing less than stunning. It was fun trying to pick out the various cliff dwellings with the aid of binoculars. We visited every single overlook! Gallup had some fine running & hiking trails (Gallop? who knew??), including Pyramid & Church Rocks, the High Desert Trails system, and an area a few miles outside of town known as McGaffey, with excellent singletrack and signed junctions. A special treat was spending the weekend in Silverton, Colorado, and getting in some great hikes/runs, both on and off the Hardrock course. We were treated to sightings of a fox at Island Lake and a bald eagle near the Continental Divide at Highland Mary Lakes!

November: Finally climbed Telescope and Wildrose Peaks, along with Corkscrew and Towne Pass Peaks, on a weeklong trip to Death Valley. My appreciation and fondness for Death Valley grow with each visit. It really is a spectacular place. I loved the trail to Telescope Peak (very runnable!), and stargazing/car camping in the Honda Element was the balls. :)

December: Back to Vermont for the holidays, where we were treated to snowstorms, ice, rain, subzero temps, an ice-encrusted car, layers upon layers of clothing, boots... criminelly! All the conditions that reminded me why a mediterranean climate--that would be southern California--is such a treat in wintertime. The trip was a good one, though: spent my b'day cross country skiing for the first time in about 3 years (I LOVE to ski!) and climbed/snowshoed/cramponed up some of my old New Hampshire 4000 footers.

January: Back to CA, on the way finishing off the Ouachita Trail in Arkansas. This was the trail I attempted to thru-hike/backpack last March but got weathered out in a freak snowstorm on Day #3 after completing only 50 of the 222 miles, basically the Oklahoma portion (yes, OK really does have mountains). Huge thanks to Chris, I was able to "run" the remaining 170 miles of the trail to Little Rock carrying only a light pack, doing a relatively easy 30-35 miles/day, none of it in the dark. With one planned 30-mile day to go, a nasty bout with food poisoning--I think from peanut butter crackers... grr!--slowed my progress to a 20, then a 10 miler. But hey, now I know I can fast walk 20 miles on one 20 oz. bottle of plain water, one gel, and one popsicle. (O_O) The OT is a lightly used, "wildernessy" long-distance trail. I saw only one backpacker and a handful of dayhikers in the 6 days I was out there. Curiously, there is also very little wildlife--few squirrels even. I did almost step on an armadillo, and we saw a bobcat one day. Arkansas has some great trails; I want to do the Ozark Highlands Trail (165 miles) one of these days as well.

February: Work trip to San Francisco, with runs in the Marin Headlands, including a Double Dipsea, after finally locating The stairs in Mill Valley. :) Also ran in the Presidio and Golden Gate Parks and across the Golden Gate Bridge. (Yes, I am a touron.) What a fun city! A few days later we were in Austin, Texas, on another work trip running around Lady Bird Lake with hundreds of Austinites. Alas, no Lance/McConaughey sightings. Probably could've been a bit more creative with dining, but got sort of infatuated with Whole Foods--THE Whole Foods of Whole Foods--they are headquartered in Austin. Yum-O! Which brings us to...

March: Uncharacteristically spent the past 5 weeks back in Ventura County, first and foremost helping to prepare for and execute Chris's Coyote Two Moon. For whatever reason, it seemed as though this year's events required a lot more energy... and there seemed to be more rooms in the house filled with C2M stuff--shirts, jackets, hats, "prizes," etc. But in the end, this year's events appeared to run more smoothly than last. The start/finish at Ojai's Thacher School worked out better, the pre-and post-race meals (mimosa anyone?) were very good, and C2M has the absolute BEST group of volunteers an RD could ever hope for. Shameless plug: C2M is a truly unique ultrarunning venue, with events spanning 6 days, including mini-golf, bowling, "talent" night, BBQ, beer drinking, and runs in Pt. Mugu State Park, including one under the full moon. Participation in these pre-run events, along with sucking up to the RD, and/or generally being a nice person, is rewarded with "bonus minutes" which are subtracted from the run time. If a runner acts like a bonehead, is rude, or bull$hits the RD or volunteers, they get "boner minutes" which are added to their run time. (As a result of this juggling of numbers, some of the more serious or competitive runners may have a harder time with this concept.) Also unique to C2M is the staggered start, whereby the slower runners get to start first--and get first dibs on the all the aid station goodies!--the idea being that runners get to see more people toward the end of the event and everyone finishes "together" within a 4-hour window, in time for Sunday brunch and previously mentioned mimosas. :) Finally, entrants can expect to receive numerous pre-event emails from the RD, virtual "novellas", as one disgruntled, "serious" runner labeled them. It's all part of this one-of-a-kind event! If you're a fun-loving, open-minded sort of ultrarunner in search of a kick-ass 100 miler with 28,000+ ft. of elevation gain (19,000 for the 100km) for 2010, check out the website here . BTW, one of the best C2M "reports" I've read--possibly my favorite race report ever--is here, 13th post. Look for a bunch of emoticons. ;-)

That brings this blog up to date, sort of. I stopped blogging in September mostly because I wanted to spend less time online and had always had issues with the quasi (is that the right word?) narcissism of blogging. However (!)... I am getting SO bad about emailing and keeping in touch with folks, AND have had many people ask about it and tell me they enjoyed reading my blog (hey, you guys need to get a life! Heehee), so here's at it once more...!!

Death Valley, November

2009-03-22T21:29:00.000-07:00

Telescope Peak:

Sierra trip '08

2008-08-30T18:38:00.000-07:00

(Precipice Lake, High Sierra Trail)

"Wow, that's a light pack you're carrying!" This was the common refrain on my three longish outings in the Sierras over the past couple of weeks. One guy followed up with "How do you SURVIVE?!" Glancing at his gargantuan backpack, I wondered the same of him.

After warming up with Mt. Whitney, my first run took me over Pine Creek Pass, down to Hutchinson Meadow, through spectacular Humphrey's Basin, over Piute Pass and down to North Lake. The Bishop locals refer to this as the Sky Marathon. If *I* were a local, I could see doing this run over and over again. An interesting flower passed on the way up the Pine Creek Trail:

My second long run was the Evolution "100k," also known as North Lake to South Lake or the Evolution Loop. As is my experience with most Sierra trails, guidebook, trail sign, and map mileages rarely jibe, sometimes being off by miles. According to the Tom Harrison map, the Evolution Loop is about 54 miles; Bishop folks call it 60 and I would concur. (No way is it only 7 miles from Muir Pass down to Leconte & only 6.6 miles from there up to Bishop Pass!) Most people take about a week to backpack the loop, but why schlep all that gear when you can traverse it in well under a day? :) (I actually ran only about 5% of it; the rest was fast walking.) As is said with the Hardrock 100, you haven't truly "Evolved" until you've done it both ways, so I may have to go back and do it in reverse...

Finally, I fastpacked the ~70-mile High Sierra Trail in two days, going from Whitney Portal to Crescent Meadow in Sequoia National Park (east to west), total on-trail time about 25 hours. (Surely it can and has been run a lot faster, but I wanted to see the whole trail in daylight.) This trail is awesome!, especially the western half starting at Kaweah Gap, where 20 miles or so have been blasted into the side of the mountain with precipitous 1000+ foot dropoffs. (Encountering a large rattling rattlesnake here was a bit unsettling). The HST certainly rivals any section of the John Muir Trail in beauty, and without question a luxuriant soak in Kern Hot Springs at the end of Day #1 positively influenced the fun-0-meter.

This fastpack was also an experiment in seeing how light I could go: I carried a sleeping bag, extra clothing, and plenty of food but no tent, pad, stove, or bear can (since I was spending the night at the hot springs, where there was a bear box). Sans water, my pack weighed less than my cat. Admittedly, Fillmore is a rather portly cat. The experiment proved successful: the benefits of comfort and, therefore, speed on the trail far outweighed any minor discomforts of sleeping on the ground under the stars and eating cold mashed potatoes for dinner!

Sierra legend Norman Clyde probably said it best: "The diversity of the scenery which the HST traverses is nothing short of marvelous. The greatest trees in the world, at least one of its most beautiful canyons, and the loftiest mountain in the continental US are indeed the major, but only a few of the many scenic attractions along the HST." This is the view looking back while ascending Kaweah Gap:

And a section of the blasted-out trail. For perspective, a human being would be a small dot in this photo.

I'll end this blog post with a sappy quote by John Muir:

"These beautiful days much enrich all my life. They do not exist as mere pictures... but they saturate themselves into every part of the body and live always."

Couple more MR photos

2008-08-30T11:28:00.000-07:00

If you look closely, you can see climbers on the route. ^

Pretty flowers on the way up ^

Guess where...

2008-08-20T10:28:00.000-07:00

RAINIER: To the top & all the way around :-)

2008-08-08T13:05:00.000-07:00

The trip to Washington was a success: THIS year we not only left the parking lot... we summitted! Our team consisted of myself, Janine, John, Doug and Grant, long-distance runners all. My teammates were no lightweights: among other accomplishments, Janine and John are veterans of the Iditarod Extreme (44 days!). They and our fearless leader Doug have completed the Grand Slam of ultrarunning, and 18-year-old Grant is the new national 50-mile trail champ for his age division, having run the White River 50 miler just 2 days previously! Here we are about a mile into the ascent. The summit looks so close but is so far...
By happenstance we ran into some runner friends from back East -- Charlie, Vicki and Barb, who were descending from a day hike to Camp Muir. With Charlie crewing, Vicki and Barb had just run the Wonderland Trail in 3 days, news I was very happy to hear because now I knew it was, indeed, going to be passable for Chet and me -- yippee! Happy smiles all around:

Our weather was great so far, but the forecast called for a storm to move in sometime after midnight. Being accustomed to going all night long in our ultra endeavors, we decided that after setting up the tents and eating dinner at Camp Muir, we'd head for the summit around 5 p.m. Umm... sure... okay... I like doing things differently! Our route was the standard Disappointment Cleaver and the Ingraham Glacier. Open crevasses abounded, and the penitentes looked like something created by Seuss. Fortunately, the route is so well traveled that we had no trouble getting around them. That's Little Tahoma in the background.
I felt great until about 13,500, when the altitude hit like a brick wall. Misery loves company, and I had plenty of it, with both Doug and Grant suffering altitude sickness. Fortunately, I only felt like I was going to puke! However, we were so close and, although a bit breezy at the crater rim, the weather was holding so we kept on climbing. Finally, the real summit!
Heh, heh... T'was a bit dark, but we could see the lights of Seattle which was pretty cool, as was crossing the crater. The descent took forever, but we intentionally took our time over the steep, hard-frozen terrain. (Most parties descend after the snow has softened up in the sun.) Here's Little Tahoma again, this time just before sunrise! As we descended lower, angry looking clouds filled the sky, so we were really happy we'd decided to climb all night.
Upon reaching Camp Muir, I decided to just head on down to Paradise since it was daylight and I knew I wouldn't sleep anyway. So, basically I unintentionally ended up climbing Rainier as a "day hike," albeit a bit slower than the fellow who climbed it in under 5 hours earlier this summer. (O_O) After a couple of days of R&R in Ashford, my BC buddy Chet (curiously, unlike the South Park Canadians, his head does not come apart when he talks) ventured south of the border to traverse the Wonderland Trail with me in 3 days. On Day 1 we simultaneously second guessed our sanity in the cold drizzle while happily anticipating the adventure ahead. Here we are at the start in Longmire (note the speedy legs)!

We were impressed by the maintenance of the WT -- this, the trail that was deemed impassable after the November 2006 flooding! We found the trail to be in excellent shape, every major river crossing with a bridge, most of them seemingly rebuilt every year. The photo below was the most impressive, well engineered bridge; there was quite a bit of movement as one crossed it. Not evident by the photo, it's pretty high off the ground. People with a fear of heights would not be happy here!
Chris crewed us and had the tents set up and all our gear available at the end of each day, so all we carried were a few pounds in our Nathan packs. I carried only one bottle since there was water everywhere, most of which I drank untreated. (I do not necessarily recommend that you do the same, but this is my norm and I haven't gotten sick yet.) Chris ended up driving about twice the mileage we ran. This photo is the start of Day 2 at Mowich Lake. Yep, that's snow we're standing on. The Northwest got a lot of late snow this year, so we had fun glissading, slippin' and slidin' across snowfields. :)
We spent the second night at White River Campground. Due to the overcast, after 2 days and roughly 60 miles, we had yet to see the mountain! Finally on Day 3 we had sun and clear skies. The terrain and views were spectacular, with flower-filled alpine meadows, fun snowfields, marmots, and warmer temps. The third day made up for the first two and then some. :-)
The finish at Longmire on Sunday afternoon: 90'ish miles, 20,000'ish feet of climb and descent, and about 27'ish hours of total running time (not including sleep!).
And now the flowers. They were just lovely! Here's a small sampling. These are called avalanche lillies.

And this is beargrass. We saw *fields* of it, especially on the first day!
Not sure of the names of these, just like all the colors.
IMO, more beautiful than the finest of cultivated botanical gardens.
This is a tiger lily. Some plants have only one bloom while others have many. The most I've seen on one stem is 9 blooms.
Isn't he CUUUTE?! Compared to Colorado marmots, Washington's are generally lighter in color, blond almost. We also saw a few pikas, a deer, and just missed seeing a black bear.

I was threatened with embarrassment worse than this photo if I didn't include it. Let's just say that after all those miles, I was feeling a bit protein deficient, so we took a jaunt up to my favorite "pretend we're in Bavaria" town -- that would be Leavenworth -- and dined on schnitzel, schweinhaxen, kraut (sauer and rot), and, of course, Spaten. Guten appetit!

Dog Daze

2008-07-25T17:52:00.001-07:00

After the 4th in Illinois, we traveled to Houston for business. Yes, Texas. Yes, in JULY. Yes, it was hot, and no, I did not leave the hotel for 48 hours. It was hot. Did I already mention that? A humid, smothering, wet, oppressive, fantasize-about-living-in-a-meat-locker-kind-of-hot. I am accustomed to heat here in California, but there is very low humidity. I spent three days running on the hotel treadmills trying to not go completely berserk. Even with the AC, the humidity was crazy. No offense to my friends from Texas, but I have to say it's my least favorite state in the country... and I've been to all of 'em 'cept North Dakota! (To be fair, I have never been to Austin which is supposed to be pretty cool. Rocky Racoon is a great event, too.)

We then flew back to the paradise that is Chicago (anything is paradise after Houston in July) and spent the weekend in Whitewater, Wisconsin. The nearby Kettle Moraine State Forest, which plays host to both the Ice Age 50 and the KM 100, had some wicked nice trails. Because of excessive rain, the John Muir Trails were closed to mountain bikes so I had them all to myself and -- due to VERY hungry and aggressive mosquitoes -- I got in a fast-for-me 20 miler. BTW, who knew there was a John Muir Trail in the Midwest?!

Back in the Windy City, we checked out the Field Museum of Natural History, home of "Sue," the biggest and best T. Rex ever unearthed, named after the paleontologist who discovered her. I loved this colorful display:

A Sue Store -- woo hoo!! Yeah, so I went a little nuts there -- read the hat! Heh, heh... normally I wouldn't wear a hat that says "BITE ME," but all my running hats were dirty, it was sunny, and we had bought the hat at Joe's Crab Shack in Houston as a C2M giveaway. I got a few strange looks. ;-)

We were total tourons and did the Sears Tower thing. Although not the high point that counts, it IS higher than Charles Mound, so I had to do it. I wanted to run up the stairs, but we were required to take the elevator, and -- get this -- it took us only to the 103rd floor, and there are 110. The OC in me found this very lame indeed. Still, the view was pretty awesome:

The past week and a half we've been back in Oxnerd, so I've been running the trails in PMSP and Ojai. There are some great trails in Ojai -- C2M is there -- but MY GOD, it gets hot in the summer! (But it's a dry heat...) On a 13 miler the other day, I went through about 90 oz. of fluids, a full 70 oz. bladder and a handheld. Of interest, word is the mountain lion population is increasing up there. (O_O) I hope to see one... from a safe distance... one that has just eaten a big meal. :p How cool would that be?! Best I managed was a tarantula near Mugu Peak last weekend.

We are leaving for Washington State on Sunday. My good friend Doug is going to lead a small group of us on Mt. Rainier. Hopefully we'll get better weather than last year, when we couldn't even leave the parking lot! Also, my friend "Chet" (pictured with me below) and I are going to attempt to run the Wonderland Trail in three days. Chet just finished H'ardrock; hopefully he can keep up. :p We realize that due to all the snow the NW received this winter and spring, the WT may be a long shot -- this site doesn't sound very encouraging (pull down a little over halfway for WT) -- but we'll inquire at the ranger station as to the latest conditions and try to give it a go. Alternately, we may run the White River 50 course just for fun. No worries... Washington is a fun playground with spectacular trails and mountains, so there's no shortage of options. Gotta go pack now.........

4th of July in... Illinois??

2008-07-07T17:14:00.000-07:00

That's right. A quirky alignment of the stars placed us in tiny Walnut, Illinois, for this year's 4th of July festivities. Walnut is about an hour east of the Quad Cities, an hour north of Peoria, and a couple hours west of Chicago -- in other words, in the middle of nowhere -- surrounded by corn, soybeans, quiet farm roads, and wonderfully friendly, down-to-Earth people. Walnut's Hometown Celebration stretched four days, with festivities ranging from the popular bean bag tourny to volleyball and softball games to the greased pig chase to the really popular beer garden (assuming you like Miller Lite, MGD, and Coors Light) and all manner of fried treats. Funnel cakes anyone? There was even a 5k road race Saturday morning in which yours truly finished second among the many hundreds of women entered. In fact, all five in our group walked away with hardware. :) In addition to the 5k, only my second ever and quite *painful* for one used to the comfortable pace of ultra-distance events!, I got in a couple of nice runs in the countryside. Sunday morning I was even out the door by 5:30 and got to witness a spectacular sunrise. THAT hasn't happened in a long time.

We then drove a couple hours north, almost to Wisconsin, in order to climb the high point of Illinois. Last month Denali; this month Charles Mound, elevation 1,227 feet! Interestingly, legal access to this high point is actually more difficult to attain than Denali. The land is privately owned, and the landowners open their property to highpointers only the first weekends of June, July, August, and September. They request that visitors park at the main road and walk a little over a mile up their beautiful lane to the summit, so at least it's a bit a of a hike and not just a driveup. Northwestern Illinois actually has tiny rolling green hills and looked more like my homestate of Vermont than what one would normally expect of Illinois. This is one of the reasons I love highpointing -- because it's brought me to places I otherwise would never have visited, and almost always I'm pleasantly surprised that the reality of a place usually surpasses my expectations.

While Charles Mound is the geographical high point -- and the one that "counts" -- the Sears Tower is actually higher at 1,451 feet, the antenna at 1,730 feet, sooo... when we're back in Chicago next week, think I'll bag the Sears Tower. (I would love to take the stairs but think I'll have to settle for the elevator with all the tourists.) It will be neat to have done both high points of my birthstate. :)

Finally, the above photo is the dregs of some of the best fried chicken I've ever eaten. The place is called "Rips" and is in Ladd, IL. The wait is long -- our group stood in line Friday night almost 90 minutes; however, the bar is open while you wait. Your choices are chicken (light or dark) and fish (light or dark), all deep fried. I had both chicken (dark) and fish (light). No matter what you order, you get a mound of fries with a piece of white bread at the bottom of the plate. The vegetable is mushrooms, breaded and deep fried of course, and the appetizer is "crumbs," the small pieces of fried batter that have fallen off the chicken and fish. To offset the grease, you are given a bowl of sliced pickles. Everyone eats with their hands; if you want a fork, you have to ask for it. Although sorely tempted, I held back from buying their "GREASE ME UP!" T-shirt. More here.

Quick trip home

2008-07-01T14:12:00.000-07:00

Last week I squeezed in a quick trip to New England to visit my folks in Northern Vermont and my beloved White Mtns. in neighboring New Hampshire. The visit was all too short, but I managed a *wicked awesome* hike up Cannon Mtn., one of my favorite running routes--a rolling 8 miler on the quiet back roads of Barnet and Peacham, and a nice visit with my ex and our dog.

My parents fed me well: BBQ chicken (by request) the first night, pancakes with real maple syrup (well duh), and yummy baked ziti the second night. So nice to be home and hard to leave the beautiful place that is Vermont in June.

Best dog in the world:

I've been getting in a lot of running miles the past couple of weeks. Three weeks of zero running miles in Alaska, then weeks of 75 and 60. Likely a coach would not approve; good thing I don't have one. :) For me, these are big weeks; even when I was racing a lot, I rarely got in more than 30-40 miles/week. It has been HOT, even here on the coast ("but it's a dry heat"), and because I am not a morning person, I get to feel the full brunt of the midday heat, quite the contrast to the subzero conditions of a month ago. Not complaining though--I feel great and like the heat!
On Thursday we embark on the next big mountain expedition: the high point of Illinois. Charles Mound, here we come! Preceding that will be the Fourth of July celebration in... drum roll... WALNUT, ILLINOIS!

San Joe-Zee

2008-06-18T19:18:00.000-07:00

(No,that's not Kansas. It's J.D. Grant Park, near San Jose.)

Chris had a business trip in SJ this week, and we flew up on Saturday in order to visit friends Ann and Wayne. Ann has a most *amazing* wine cellar, and along with Lisa and John, we imbibed in a couple of California chardonnays, three French bourgognes--1979, 1982, and 1986 vintages!--and two sweet dessert wines, sorry I can't be more specific. If that wasn't enough, Ann served a scrumptious five-course dinner as well! Had to have some food to go with all that wine!

On Sunday I was feeling completely and totally unmotivated to run or exert myself in any way after so much wine the night before, so we DROVE up Mt. Diablo (trying to avoid all the road bikers) and walked the nature trail loop around the summit. Hah! I did pick up a map so will be ready to hit the trails next visit, many miles there!

I love visiting the Bay Area with its abundance of trails and open-space parks. One of my favorites so far is J.D. Grant. Only 20 minutes east of the city, up the narrow and winding Mt. Hamilton Road, this park has been almost deserted every time I've been there. Except for the sound of airplanes, it is also a very quiet place and one with lots of wildlife. In a 15-mile run, I saw a coyote, lots of birds of prey, a bunch of wild pigs, a deer, and about 3 trillion comical ground squirrels. :)

Tuesday I got in about 14 miles and 4000 ft. of vertical on and around Mission Peak, always a good climb and workout, and on Wednesday a quick 8 miler on the New Almaden Trail (reminiscent of the Wildwood Trail in Portland in the way it weaved in and out of the terrain's curves) in Almaden Quicksilver Park, new terrain for me. Tuesday night we had dinner and more good wine with our friends the uber-cool Zombies and got to see their awesome new *retail store* in Palo Alto (opening later this summer). We wish them continued success!!

Flew back to Santa Barbara Wednesday night (SO much more of an enjoyable airport than nasty LAX!), with a spectacular full moon over the ocean to enjoy on the drive home on PCH. :) Home for a few days, then over to the Right Coast early next week...

Post Denali ponderings, Part II

2008-06-13T14:38:00.000-07:00

I decided against doing another day-by-day account of our Denali trip since the West Buttress route is so well known, traveled, and documented, AND since Mats is doing such a good job over on VFTT. (Another of our team members, Arm, has posted 100+ nice photos!)

After weighing our gear for the flight out of Talkeetna and coming to the astonishing conclusion that we averaged about 117 lbs.!! per person (although mine was more in the 100 lb. range), I commented that my JMT speed hike pack weighed in at 4 lbs. at the start. This prompted a sort of compare-and-contrast between climbing Denali via the WB and blitzing the JMT. While on my run today, I got a little carried away with it. Here goes--JMT first, then Denali (some numbers are educated estimates):

Total miles hiked: 223 / 38
Average miles per day: 58 / 2.7
Total elevation gain, in feet: 38,000 / 18,000
High point reached: 14,505 / 19,918
Highest pass: Forester 13,153 / Denali 18,200
Demigod: John Muir (duh) / Bradford Washburn
Miles hiked in the dark: Many / 0--it was light all the time!
Partners in crime: 2--crew Chris & Deborah / 7--Frodo, Lloyd, Arm, Garret, Jeff, Mats, & Rob
Time spent in tent: Not nearly enough / Way too much
Surface: Dirt, rock, kitty litter-pumice / Snow & ice
Footwear: Montrail Hardrocks 13 oz. each / La Sportiva Nuptse mountaineering boots 3 lbs. each, MSR snowshoes, Black Diamond crampons, OR overboots up high
Gaiters: Dirty Girls, short / Mountain Hardware, high
Pack: Nathan Intensity / North Face Snow Leopard, circa early 90s (& child's sled low on mtn.)
Average daytime temp: Pleasant (60-70s) / Cold (0-10s)
Layers of clothing: 1 / 5, including down jacket at 19,000 ft.
Painkillers taken: 8 Tylenol / None
Sunscreen: Lots on 80% of body / Lots on 5% of body (face only)
Days without shower: 3 / 14
Food: Mary Jane's Farm pastas, spuds, oatmeal, Snickers bars, jerky, nuts, salami / Same
Java: Starbucks Doubleshots / Folgers instant (possibly the most significant hardship of the trip)
Water: Plenty / Plenty (just had to melt a boatload of snow in order to get it)
Poop: WAG bags in Whitney Zone / Clean Mtn. Cans on entire route
Permits: $15 (for the Mt. Whitney Trail) / $200 per person
Favorite sections: Rae Lakes, Pinchot Pass, Evolution Valley / Fairview Inn, Talkeetna :)
Most adrenaline producing: Climbing Half Dome on reconnaisance hike / Flying to the Kahiltna Glacier, climbing the fixed ropes, traversing the 16 ridge, climbing to Denali Pass unroped, descending Denali Pass roped (i.e. like everything above 14,000 ft.)
Least favorite part: Lyell Canyon / Trying to sleep at 17,200 feet
Best campsite: Lower Evolution Valley / 14,000 ft. Basin Camp (when the sun was out)
Jumping-off town: Lone Pine, CA / Talkeetna, AK
Funny place names: Tully Hole, Bubb's Creek, Happy Isles / Motorcycle Hill, Squirrel Point, Washburn's Thumb, Pig Hill
Crowd factor: High / High
Foreigners: A handful / Many
Quizzical comments: "Well, aren't YOU adventurous?!" / "I DON'T KNOW!" (Hong Kong climbers' response to every question)
Flora seen: Lots / A tiny bit of lichen
Fauna: Lots--birds, marmots, pikas, deer / 1 Raven (Talkeetna population omitted from count)
Fuel: One 8 oz. isobutane canister / 10 gallons Coleman
and finally...
Pack weight:

Post Denali ponderings

2008-06-07T18:23:00.000-07:00

Home again safe & sound with all digits intact after a fab 17 days in Alaska with Team Dom, pictured below at the 14,000 foot camp! That's top row Bob aka Frodo, Lloyd, Garrett, and bottom row moi, Rob, Jeff, and Mats (he's not an albino--that's sunscreen on his face). Team member #8, Arm, is missing because he took the photo.

Having landed at LAX just this morning after a red eye from ANC, I'm still processing all the fun--and it WAS fun in an extreme, masochistic (read: I-can-go-two-whole-weeks-without-a-shower!!) sense (and yes, I did actually "wash" my hair with Arm's hand sanitizer and a liter of water one day). I'm contemplating whether to write up a sort of sole-female, novice day-by-day account or whether to leave it in executive summary form. For now, will opt for the latter.

BTW, for those who were fooled, the previous two posts were ghostwritten by a certain jokester we'll call "Chris," but the facts are almost completely accurate. We did have a marginally functioning sat phone complete with 3 lb. (?) solar panel but no Blackberry, Gooseberry, or Dingleberry... two plus weeks without internet--oh my!

Our team public affairs director and eternal optimist, Mats the Swede, is in the process of posting a day-by-day summary on the northeastern US hiking website Views From the Top. (Click on Trip Reports, then "Team Dom Denali Attempt Day by Day.")

As previously mentioned by my ghostwriter, we lucked out and were able to fly onto the Kahiltna glacier late on Thursday, May 22, and over the next week and a half gradually made our way up the mountain to a high camp of 17,200 ft., where we spent three restless nights, punctuated by the panic-provoking sensation of trying to breathe with plastic bags over our heads. This lovely piece of real estate was preceded by 10,000 vertical feet of sled hauling, fixed rope ascending, eye-popping/leg-vibrating, multi-thousand foot sure death-inducing dropoffs, subzero temps, waaay too many hours in the tents, mastering the pee bottle, and getting to answer the call of nature with the aid of Clean Mountain Cans. Damn, but THAT was fun! The guys were chivalrous enough to never demand that *I* carry the contents to the nearest crevasse. Eww. (Why yes, as a matter of fact, I CAN "be" female when it is of personal benefit.)

On Monday, June 2, all eight of us started for the summit. One of our unfortunate compatriots who was suffering from altitude sickness turned back at 18,200 feet as did our fearless team leader who opted to accompany him. (He'd already summitted in 2004.) Another of our members decided to take off solo; he did summit. The remaining five, of whom finishing as a team was paramount, stuck together, maintaining the pace of the slowest member. Alas, the weather turned on us before we could achieve our goal--it was nasty indeed, w/~30-40 mph (?) blowing snow and subzero temps--necessitating our turning back at the 19,900 foot level, approximately 400 feet below the summit. The trek back "home" bordered on Epic, with none less than five self/group roped arrests on the infamous Denali Pass/Autobahn/most deadly section of the route requiring about three hours to traverse a mile. Needless to say, it was a night *I* will not soon forget.

(O_O)

Although we still had a few days to spare, we unanimously agreed to get the flog off the mountain and retreat to the outpost of Talkeetna to eat real food, drink beer, and hang out with like-minded fringe elements of society. If you are ever in the neighborhood, don't miss the historic Fairview!! :-) With heavy hearts, our Alaskan escape from reality was over all too soon as we retired to Anchorage and our respective flights home.

Here are a couple of shots, with more to follow...

My tentmates-turned-bros, team leader Frodo and snow melter extraordinaire (and soon-to-be new dad!) Lloyd:

Steep section of trail heading up the West Buttress headwall. Just above this point it gets really steep, necessitating the use of fixed ropes and ascenders.
Gotta go... for my first run in 3 weeks!

PR for Elevation -- wooHOO!!

2008-05-31T19:29:00.000-07:00

OK, no more foliage schlepped in by our local NPS buddies. Just lots of... oh, what is this white stuff all around us? sounds like... "though"... "thno"... oh, dang, must be the diminishing brain function!!

Big thrill of the day -- washed my hair for the first time since we landed on the snow!! I wonder if Pantene will give me a promo spot on some future TV ad...

We ventured ever higher today, some of us to 16,200 (my PR to that point), others to 17,200 to stash that single malt scotch. Ascending The Wall (the last 800 ft of vertical climb on fixed rope just before 16,200 camp) caught my breath more than a couple times! We all re-grouped at 14,200, and we may try to creep back up to 17,200 today to take advantage of good weather. (It was so warm today, I donned my running hat and tried to get some tan on my arms -- looks like I'm having fun, doesn't it?) The forecast looks good for the next few days, so we'll likely dig up some motivation to summit while conditions are favorable. Of course, the higher we go, the heavier the task of moving expeditiously, but we won't know the full challenge until we start up again. The final objective, of course, being to get back down safely and happy for having at least taken on the trek.

Most likely, won't be able to post again until we're back down to the NPS Oasis at 14,200. Boy, the hot springs behind the NPS tent sure will be a treat!! Sure hope we get back before Happy Hour closes...