February 27, 2011

Update time!
First, there was Langlauf (all the way back on February 13th).  The snow, and more importantly, my waxing, was so much better this year!  Last year was so miserable that I almost didn't want to ski woods anymore.  However, the skis are too pretty to just have hanging out in the living room--they need to get out and see some snow.  The bad news is that I felt faster than I actually was, which tells me that I'm getting too old, too fat, and too slow.  I skied the 10k in 54:35.5--good enough for 1st female on wooden skis, 4th in my age group, and 32nd female overall.

Last weekend I led a Friday night snowshoe for the Mountaineers.  I had poor attendance, but that didn't matter--it was a beautiful night!  Full moon, scattered clouds, and best of all, no wind--not even on the summit!

I spent my Saturday pruning the apple orchard, which is a good workout by itself.  Sunday I skied again--skate this time.  I did The Wall for only the second time ever, and again felt very out of shape.  I had to stop several times to catch my breath, but each time I pretended that I was just admiring the view (it was a beautiful day!).

Thursday was our first snow day of the year--I think the news said it was technically a blizzard.  I was awakened just a little after 3:30am when the electricity went out.  The wind was roaring outside, at one point I heard a tree crash back in the woods, and I could not fall back asleep.  I finally got out of bed a little before 5am, and since the electricity was still out I had to find my walkie talkies so that I could get AM radio.  That's how I heard that school was canceled for the day.  The electricity came back on around 8am--I only have electric heat, so I was pretty happy that it came back on!  It was frigid and windy all day long, but I still bundled up in the early afternoon for a three-mile run on the Foothills loop.  It was so cold I nearly turned back after the first half mile.

Finally, there was today's outing.  It was finally warm enough that I felt I could safely and comfortably venture outside (yesterday it was approximately -5 F when I woke up, so today's 20 F was a real improvement!).  I did the 110/140 loop from the lower Mount Kit Carson trailhead.  On the way up 110, I found a snowshoe.  Just one.  How does somebody lose a snowshoe and not realize it?!  Someone else had actually found it first and hung it from a tree along the trail, but with another snowstorm on the way tonight I decided to take it down to the park office so that hopefully it can be reunited with its person.  I had the only tracks on 140.  This is the new trail that was just put in last summer.  I helped work on the tread on portions of it, so it makes it especially sweet to snowshoe on it today!  

February 9, 2011

I'm still behind.  In fact, I can't even remember everything I have been up to since my last post two weeks ago.  I know I have been out running a bit more here lately--I'm so sore I can barely walk.  In fact, I got new trailrunners on Monday and tonight I broke them in properly on a three-mile loop in the Dishman Hills.  I really need to be more consistent with my running!

I did run last Saturday, right after a thrift store outing to locate the perfect Langlauf costume for this coming Sunday.  I found a good one for this year!