A Good Run...and Ultrarunning

Along the lines of the bride reminding me  about the ostensible origins of this blog, let me tell you about an 8.5 mile Appalachian Trail run that I undertook last Sunday with my good trail friend, JS.  This play-by-play is geared towards a newer Ultrarunner who might have landed here on this blog.

We hatched the scheme on a Wednesday, for Sunday. The weather forecast looked a but unsettled, but we proceeded.  However, as the time grew closer the weather looked worse. In fact, I called JS on Saturday evening saying I was still good to go but offering him an out if he didn't feel like running in the rain. JS declined, saying in effect, "I kinda like dealing with whatever Mother Nature throws at us."

So we met at daybreak a Pine Grove Furnace State Park in south central PA, dropped a car, and proceeded in the other car to the start of the run at  Big Flat. We needed to wait about 10 minutes until it was light enough to see the trail, and started off. It was raining, light to moderate, a condition that persisted for the duration of the run.

The air temperature was about 45F, and both JS and I opted for tights, thinking of leg warmth later in the run when we would have slowed down.  On my torso I wore a long-sleeve polypro top and fleece vest; JS was dressed in a nylon jacket, but I'm not sure whether the shirt underneath was long- or short-sleeved.  Regardless, neither of us got chilly during the run, even with the becoming soaked later.  The key is not to wear cotton.

We each carried a single water bottle in a waist pack.  I also carried a small bag of my go-to trail snack, peanut M&Ms, but did not eat any during the run.

The trail was soggy, at places more than soggy, as we splashed through ankle deep water in the low spots.  After about half a mile, there was no longer any thought of keeping your feet dry; that dream was toast.

However, prior experience has taught us that running in wet feet is really no problem.  It's just a shock the first time your foot gets submerged.

This run was point to point rather than a loop, and was a net downhill, so it ran a bit faster than normal. I had a baseball cap low over my eyes to try to keep the rain from my glasses, but that failed as they were soon covered in droplets and fog.  Every half mile or so I needed to dip my glasses into a puddle or stream to "clean" them off...which helped me see for about half a mile.

The first half of the run was a fairly smooth trail, with some ups and downs, more or less along the ridge top.  At length we reached the point where the trail broke down from the ridge, a real nice slightly downhill trail, until a stream crossing of Tom's Run, a year-round stream that is usually about 3 feet wide.  Today it was double that, and a pretty good torrent. After the wet-footed crossing, our next mile or so was a rocky downhill plunge over which JS scampered much like I'd imagine a mountain goat might.  It was a joy to observe his sure-footedness.

By and by we passed the Tom's Run Shelter and continued on a soggy jeep trail until another rocky stretch.  In another mile we recrossed Tom's Run, now quite a cataract, via a bridge that we were grateful to use.

The final mile of easy trail went, well, easily, and soon we hove into view of the car. We wrung out our clothes as best we could, laid towels on the seats, and drove back to pick up the start vehicle.  Here JS and I shook hands, said "Good run!" sincerely and gratefully, and each headed home.

A good run.  That's what it was.

More Trail Work...and Ultrarunning

On Monday I headed up Alice Trail to its junction with the Tuscarora Trail for some serious weed whacking of briars.  This is in southern PA, just south of where the Tuscarora crosses PA Rt 16 between Mercersburg and McConnellsburg, and heading south from there.

But first, the installation of a signpost I had made to mark that junction.  Up there on the narrow Pennsylvania ridgetop there is a scant covering of dirt, then the underlying rock.  I had hauled up a digging iron to try to make a hole...the best I could get was about  12" deep after several test holes, so I resorted to piling stones around the post as in a cairn.

At the bottom of the buried end of the post I had inserted a 12" piece of re-bar laterally through the post.  When the dirt and small rocks are firmly tamped down around the post, the re-bar serves as a physical deterrent to someone (or some bear, seriously) trying to pull out the signpost.

The signpost is quite stable and should last awhile.  Of course, in the backcountry, if someone wants to destroy a trail sign with bullets or brute force, they'll do it.  I hope that the remote location weeds out the idiot faction, and only serious hunters and hikers will pass by here.

The weed whacking went slowly.  Very slowly.  As in forward progress of about 1/2 mile in 90 minutes slowly.

I was assisting my trail buddy Peter, who's is the overseer for that portion of the Tuscarora.  The briars in some places had rendered the trail  almost impassable in a practical sense.  The technique we resorted to in a few areas of particularly heinous briars was to bring the weedwhacker down from about 6' up, chewing up the briars from top to bottom.

This section, to my knowledge, had not been cut in 2013, so this was 2 years of growth.  My hope is that with the briars now cut back to a 6' trail width, future weed whacking efforts will be more akin to maintenance than (virtually) cutting new trail.

The link to Ultrarunning?  I love trail running.  Somebody has to maintain those trails.  It's pretty simple.

Oh, and another reason:

Box turtle on the Alice Trail.  All photos by Gary.

Tuscarora Trail Maintenance

I was over at the Tuscarora Trail on Thurs this week doing some weedwhacking of the rampant briars and weeds along the ridgetop trail.  Due to disease and insects, many of the trees along the crest have died (gypsy moth, oak leaf roller), letting more sunshine reach the ground, resulting in a veritable explosion of weedy understory growth.

The trail is barely passable in certain parts between PA 16 south to PA 456--long pants and long sleeves are a necessity or you'd be cut to ribbons by the briars.

So, although my official overseer duties are limited to the Reese Hollow Shelter and the Reese Hollow Trail, there's not much point in having "my" trail (which links the valley access point with the ridgetop Tuscarora Trail) be all spiffied up with nowhere to go after you reach the top.  So I pitched in.

Let me tell you, this type of weedwhacking is pretty arduous.  My objective was to cover the 3 miles between Hell's Hill Trail and Reese Hollow Trail, heading south to north.  However, due to me going off trail on my way up the poorly marked Hell's Hill Trail and veering south somewhat, I reached the Tuscarora perhaps a mile south of the Hell's Hill junction (towards the Yellow Trail).

Thinking the day would go faster, I just began my weedwhacking there.  Turns out in actual experience, my pace was about 1/2 mile per hour, so in 5 hours of work I was able to cover perhaps 2.5 miles...at best.  By the end of the time I was pretty much shaken to pieces from the incessant vibration. 

Left undone is approximately 2 miles of trail directly south of the Reese Hollow Trail junction heading towards the junction with Hell's Hill Trail.  So another trip is required, but this time hopefully the overseer for this section will be back from a trip and we'll be able to team up.

Blazes...and Ultrarunning

Nope, this post in NOT about those helpful painted marks on trees and rocks that show you where the trail is.  I love me some of those blazes!

Rather I want to talk about fires.  Or more properly, people talking about fires, as in newscasters.

Seems that there are a lot of serious wildfires out west right now.  It's been a hot, dry summer, making conditions right for fire.  National news has been devoting a lot of coverage to the situation, especially since many homes are at risk, to say nothing about the thousands of acres burned.  I have nothing but sympathy and heartfelt wishes for a good outcome to all affected.

But what I really wanted to get to was the use of the word "blaze."  See, I think it's fair to say that you and I never use the word blaze, as in "Did you see that house over on Madison Street that was destroyed in a blaze?", or "Man, those blazes out west are really terrible this year!"

Nope, blaze is a word only used by newscasters.  Every time I watch the news (whether national or local) and they present a story about a fire (whether structure, grass, or forest), I wait for the talking head to use the word blaze.  It actually would make a good drinking game, where you have to take a drink every time the TV person uses the word.

It usually is not long in coming, as newcasters must get tired of repeatedly saying  fire this and fire that.

Except that normal people simply never say blaze.  It sounds contrived, and it is.

The connection to Ultrarunning?  My thing about blazes--the trail kind, not the fire kind--is that I wish they would incorporate some sort of reflective component into the paint.  Many times when I am running in low light conditions, say around sunrise or sunset, or if it's foggy, having a blaze reflect back at me from my flashlight or headlamp beam would be SO very helpful.

I expect to begin some volunteer trail maintenance duties soon with the Potomac Appalachian Trail Club, and I will be sure to make the case for reflectivity.