Week in Review (June 20 - June 26)

Tuesday (13,661 steps) - Up early to do a Peloton ride before going to work in the office. Went for a walk and did my cross training at lunch. After work I went home and pulled more weeds in the backyard. Really cannot believe how out of control everything got after all that rain.

Wednesday (26,004 steps) - Did something crazy and got up to run before work. I haven't done this in ages, and really the only reason that I did was because it was supposed to be a zillion degrees by lunch, so I sucked it up. I had 16 repeats of 75 seconds at fast and 75 recovery. I realized on the 15th repeat that I had only programmed 15, not 16. Ah well. Hit all my paces and got it over with.

Work in the office, I guess it was fine. No recollection. 

New signage! Kinda neat!

Walked to REI at lunch because I still needed to exchange my camp pillow. They didn't have any in stock but they were able to process my exchange at the register. 

Thursday (11,844 steps) - Up early for another adventure! Months ago (6, to be exact) we were in the middle of a horrendous winter and Kristin suggested we book some campsites for when it got to be warm. We reserved a couple sites, but once plans got finalized we realized we would need an extra site, so Kristin and I decided to head out early so we could get first come first serve sites. Our goal was to be out by 9, thinking that arriving in Buena Vista by noon (on a Thursday) would be plenty of time to get a FF site. The drive was uneventful, but we did hit a bit of traffic outside Fairplay. We arrived just after noon to a FULL CAMPSITE. Crap! Ben and I headed down the road to see what else we could find, and we totally lucked out getting the very last site at the Chalk Creek campground, and the site was SWEET. Spacious and right next to the creek. Olive loved it!

We spent a bit of time getting stuff unloaded and set up. We were still waiting for Tyler to come up and eventually decided to head into Buena Vista to go to Eddyline for a beer and a snack. Tyler showed up later in the evening and we all hung out at our site (because it was the best). 

Friday (20,338 steps) - Didn't have any exciting plans for the day, but after rolling out of bed we decided we would head to St. Elmo to get a hike in before Terri arrived. No idea what we were expecting, but it was hilly for sure!

There was a secondary "ghost town" a little bit up the road from St. Elmo. 

Even though it was supposed to be a rest day for me, we kept hiking! We had no idea how far the trail went.

Olive was THRILLED when we found a big section of snow. I risked letting her off leash so she could run around - and she had a blast!

I was glad we turned around when we did, because Olive definitely was dragging the last mile or so. Didn't help that apparently her adorable furry toes attract all sorts of stuff that got caught in her toe hair and we had to take numerous breaks to get stuff out. 

Terri had arrived at the campsite by the time we finished, but without having phone service, we didn't know where she went. Ben and Kristin needed to get some stuff done that required internet, so we all headed back into BV to Eddyline for a beer and snack. Also went to the grocery store (again) before heading back to camp. Once again, spent time at our campsite.

Saturday (45,229 steps) - Early wake up call! Today's plan was to check out the scariest (to me) section of the High Lonesome course! 4500' of climbing in less than 10 miles, reaching an elevation of 13,100'. I haven't been that high up since last summer, so I wanted to see how I would do prior to race day. Last minute Terri and Kristin decided that they would start at the "finish" and meet us below the summit. So off I headed with Tyler and Ben.

There was no easing into this "run" - it headed uphill right away. I was out of breath just minutes in.

I had the gpx route loaded into my watch - specifically for the lower section since we were actually starting at a different trail head than the actual course. Once we got a few miles in we were following Brown's Creek for a bit and it was really pretty!

I was definitely feeling the effects of hard work and getting higher up in elevation. I was trying to simulate as close to "race pace" as I could without things getting too crazy - but decided I needed to sit for a few minutes to have a snack.

As soon as we got close to tree line the wind really picked up - and it wasn't great. Earlier in the day we had joked that having a puffy coat would probably be overkill, but honestly it was REALLY chilly. 

Thankfully, there had been a lot of melting in the last week. I had seen videos and pictures from a group that had done this same segment and they showed a LOT more snow than we encountered. Even the sections that we did have were totally manageable. And in the next few weeks should be completely gone.

I was definitely relieved when we got to the top! The single track was replaced by a nice, wide, dirt road.

We had quite the panorama of views of all the surrounding mountains. It was truly a beautiful day!

We started to head down the trail and looking down the switchbacks looked soooo runnable and smooth!

Spoiler: Not super smooth. Lots of loose rocks.

LOTS of loose rocks. This section reminded me of coming down from Lone Peak in the Rut.

I opted to put my poles away when it became even rockier, with almost scree. Not fun. It'll be hard to make up time on this downhill. The only section that seemed to have snow still was being dug out (we assume by a private party of ATV'ers or something).

When we finally met up with Terri and Kristin we took a short break so that we could eat. I was STARVING by this point. I'll have to figure out a good way to get food during the race - I guess I could still do a sandwich but not sure how well that'll work out. Thankfully the awful rocks didn't go on forEVER, and there were even some sections that were more "runnable" than others. Terri and Kristin had warned us that there were some unavoidable water crossings. They were not wrong and the water was SUPER COLD. 

We finally made it down and still had just a few miles on the dirt road to the campground. 

Running on the road was NOT fun. Most people were pretty courteous, but we were on a fairly narrow should and it was HOT. It was of course longer to get to the campground than we had figured based on the map. (No one should be surprised by this). We figured we should get Tyler's car sooner rather than later. Stopped quickly to get some beer and a few groceries before getting back to the campground. Jeramiah and the family were supposed to be arriving, and eventually we headed to their site to visit for a few. Another night hanging out!

Sunday (12,311 steps) - Sad day, time to leave :( 

We still hadn't gone to the waterfall nearby. The trail head was literally across the street from our campground, so we decided we would all go on the hike before we dispersed. (Except for Terri, she was probably the only smart one, and she headed home early and probably avoided all the traffic). The Agnes Vaille Falls hike/trail was supposed to only be a mile or so out and back, so we figured we could get it done quickly.

The trail hasn't hard, but it WAS a bit more technical than I expected. Olive did really good jumping on boulders and being carried across the water (a few times). I think she could actually be a mountain dog!

Ben and I got a really good view of the waterfall!

And of course we realized we didn't get our selfie with the waterfall until we were too far down to go back.

Ben, me, Jeramiah and Madi, Tyler, Kristin, Doug, Elanor and Stephanie

We hurried down a bit as we still had to load everything up. We got out a bit later than expected (which shouldn't be a surprise) and were going the "long" way home through Frisco because I had plans to meet up with the gal buying my Fenix 6s. We quickly stopped at Whole Foods for a slice of pizza and then headed over to Outer Range. Got my watch sold then headed home, unfortunately hitting all kinds of traffic. At least we got home at "reasonable" time. Long/short weekend over.

Monday (25,829 steps) - Work from home. I had a faster run on schedule, and since it looked like it was going to be hot, I took my lunch very early. Took Olive for a long walk. Finally, the sunflowers are back!! They are late this year, probably because of all the rain. 

Also, flowering cacti!

After work I decided it was time to yet again do more yardwork. Olive was "helping":

I can never ever EVER let this get so out of control again. Ben came over to help and he mowed the front while I pulled more weeds in the back. Pretty sad that it's maybe only a third under control. I don't necessarily mind pulling weeds, but even with bug spray I'm getting eaten alive by mosquitos. Went to Torchy's to get food to go and then had a beer at 4 Noses. 

Stats:

• 155,216 steps
• 32.89 miles run
• 30 minutes of cardio
• 45 minutes of strength