Training Log Archive: Funderstormin

Stephania and I met up for a run at Hilton Falls in the beautiful sunshine. I kept getting us lost. Then we had a parking lot picnic.

In Hamilton for a conference for a few days so decided to tack on a short Bruce Trail run at the end of the day. Trails were a bit muddier than expected to modified my plan to do a lollipop loop of main and side trail and ran / slid the main trail out and then ran the road back. The bonus to all of the rain we've had lately is that the creeks and waterfalls were flowing beautifully!

It's kind of exciting to be logging an adventure race, as it's been awhile since I have done one! I think that the last one I did was SCAR in 2017.

Over drinks one night in February Amber and I decided to race the Trek together. She graciously dropped down from the Trek Elite, which I refused to do! Neither one of us felt super prepared going in, but it turned out to be a really great and fun day that reminded me why I love adventure racing!

We had a decent paddle, trying not to get caught in the middle of too many thrashing paddles. We jogged conservatively from the paddle TA to Glebe Park, knowing we'd need our energy later on. Found our three controls without incident, and then started on the section I was most worried, biking, due to lack of saddle time over the past couple of years! I didn't love the uphills, but Browner's trusty steed made the downhills and anything off-road so much fun! I broke the speed limit of 50km going down one of the hills! The muddy, wet stuff felt like AR biking at its finest, and I really enjoyed it, although I was happy enough when the singletrack at the top of Sir Sam's (which would be lovely dry and less crowded, I am sure) was done! We got our last trekking CPs and ran down the hill. We were lucky in getting on a bus just before it took off back to Haliburton!

I had an equal amount of fun volunteering on Sunday for the short course, and loved seeing all of the family teams out there. One kid was only 4 years old and every time I saw him, he looked like he was having the BEST time out there! It was amazing how much drier the bike conditions were on Sunday.

Super fun weekend, and I'm also so impressed with STORM et al's organizational skills! No detail is ever forgotten!

Next up is RockstAR with Simpy!

C • Congratulations! :) 3

Short ride with Browner at Kelso, who is very generously lending me her bike for Storm the Trent this weekend!

Wanted to squeak in one more short stint on the Appalachian Trail before my long drive home so found a nearby section and did an out and back between two roads. It was about 6:30 when I started so really nice and quiet out there and I didn't see anyone else.

Morning hike in Wells State Park before breakfast. Nice way to start the day!

Relocated from Wells State Park to Beartown State Forest, a little closer to home near the MA / NY border. I chose this park because of its proximity to the Appalachian Trail and it was lovely! Just 12 rustic campsites that were almost all empty on a Sunday.

I found a "signature hike" for the park called The Pond Loop + Ledges that sounded interesting as part of it was on the AT. What the instructions DIDN'T say is that it wasn't a loop - it was a loop + an out and back. After reaching the highlight of the route (the ledges, overlooking a beautiful mountain vista), I just kept on going on the AT for a couple of miles before I checked Google maps and then realized I wasn't heading back to finish the pond loop! On the plus side, I got more time on the AT than if I'd followed the actual route.

When I booked this trip, I found a no frills ($15!) trail race near the campground I was staying at on Friday night and thought, why not? It was a beautiful but difficult course of 100% singletrack winding up and down Goat Hill. My achilles was giving me a lot of grief and my mind and body weren't really working together, so once I realized this was how it was going to go down, I just went into tourist mode and took a bunch of pictures and chatted with the aid station volunteers. It was a stunning day and a really beautiful course!

Exploring trails in Green Lakes State Park in New York, a really lovely park I'd never been to before just outside of Syracuse.

Had a gym class on the docket but when I saw I might be able catch a sunrise instead, I cancelled it and headed to Snyder's Flats for a morning run. It was such a beautiful, quiet morning and I definitely made the right decision!

There was no lovely sunrise to admire but we were grateful that the only rain had coming during the night. For early May, the temperatures were so nice and mild and I was comfortable sleeping in just a t-shirt with my liner / quilt combo. We enjoyed a nice leisurely coffee and breakfast before packing up and hitting the trail just before 9. The day before, someone had warned us about the climbing and even though we knew to take his advice with a grain of salt, I was a little worried about what was yet to come!

Although this was definitely the uphill way, it was never terrible, especially with all of the alcohol our of our pack, thanks to the night before! There was so much variation in the terrain we were hiking through that it definitely kept things interesting. We finished off just before lunchtime and enjoyed some parking lot treats before driving to the Ellicotville Brewing Company for lunch.

When we crossed back into Canada, the border guard had a lot of specific questions about our route, and it turned out, he had hiked the same loop before!

This was a very successful little weekend adventure that definitely got me excited for more backcountry trips this coming summer!

C • Thanks for scouting this ou... 4

I have been craving an early season backpacking trip to test out some gear and get a night out before the bugs descend! I've had my eye on a couple of routes in Allegheny National Forest in PA, which surprisingly is closer to me than Algonquin, but also requires no permits or reservations. I decided on the Morrison - Rimrock loop as a straightforward weekend trip and was delighted with Greg D. agreed to come with me. Although I am happy to go on these adventures alone, it is especially fun to have company in camp. I am, after all, a pretty chatty gal.

The journey down went very smoothly and we started out on the trail just after lunchtime. We planned to take the longer route to the campsite, which we later discovered is the less common route because it is a more gentle descent (and therefore also gentler ascent) than the other half of the loop. The skies were cloudy but the temperature was very comfortable and the trails were beautiful.

I always get SO EXCITED when getting near to a backcountry campsite and this was certainly no exception. The Morrison campground is an actual campground that you can boat or hike in to. There were quite a few other campers but we managed to find a quiet site away from the rowdy boaters that had a lovely flat platform for tents and was right on the water. There was no sunset, but we had a lovely fire overlooking the lake.