Running Chick

Almost two weeks have passed since my last update? Sheesh, where does the time go?

I’m just coming to the end of week 2 of my 12-week half marathon training program, and things are going well. I’m quite a bit faster than I anticipated I’d be (more about that in another post) and I’m not having any leg-related issues. However, I’m about to start creeping into the weekly mileage danger zone and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t concerned. Fingers crossed.

Last Saturday, we spent the afternoon in Copper Harbor tromping around Fort Wilkins, boozing at Zik’s and cheering James on in the Backcountry Ski Race. He came in first in the downhill race and second overall. Yay James! There’s lots of photos in the gallery, but here are some of my favorites.

Orange juice? No, bottom of the barrel Bell’s Winter Wheat. Um, pass.

Josh has a camera that takes videos. Joy. He has a YouTube channel, too.

This weekend is the Copper Dog 150 and we’re helping out with amateur radio controls. I have a primo control point on the Mohawk/Gay Road so I’ll be able to get a good look at the teams as they go through. It’s going to be a late night, though, the last team isn’t scheduled to go through my checkpoint until 12:30AM!

After two failed attempts, I finally found the Oskar Cemetery today on my tromp through the woods.  I also explored two new trails.  Much excitement! The snowmobilers have been very busy.  The trail looks like I-75 with all the motorized tracks. And non-motorized. Coyote, I think.  Some of the other tracks I saw that I was able to identify were rabbit, deer, fox, squirrel, mouse/teeny tiny rodent, dogs, dudes, and skier peoples. I finally ended up finding the cemetery. I walked around for a bit and spent about 10 minutes trying to get a decent snap of this guy. On my way back I found a new trail.  It basically looped around and ended up in the back of the folks' house at the 2-mile mark. I wanted to get some more miles in so I used my gps to route me back to the main trail.  After following that for a bit, I came around a corner and found another new trail! This trail led me through an open field.  The wind was really strong and cold, so I didn't stay on it long.  On the way back, I passed through some scrub brush and in all of the brown, these vibrant red berries caught my eye.  I have no idea what type of berries they are, but they sure were striking against the drab, brown of everything else around them. I also thought this group of birch trees looked pretty cool, too. In all, I tromped for a little over 2 hours for 4.10 miles. Fun, fun, fun!

Our cold spell finally passed on Sunday and it was a beautiful, sunny, blue-skied, 23 degree day.  The perfect day for another tromp through the woods on my snowshoes.

My tracks from last week are barely noticeable after all the snow we received in the past few days.  There were lots of other tracks around from furry critters and critters on skis.  No snowmobile tracks though, so I ended up breaking trail all the way.

I bought some gaiters, but they were too small to even fit around my calves.  I guess I must have man-calves.  Gotta get me some gaiters.  I also got a new camera, so I was messing around with the macro function, thanks to the tiny pine cones I found.

 I tried to find the cemetery and ended up taking two wrong trails before finally giving up and heading back.  The good news is that I think I did end up finding the trail to the cemetery, so next weekend I'll take another stab at getting there.  In all, I tromped around for 3.25 miles and got to spend two hours outside on a really nice day.