Training Log Archive: blairtrewin

We're never shy about bagging the banks (and I've sometimes been heard to say that anyone who thinks that the public sector has a monopoly on large and inflexible bureaucracies has never dealt with a bank), but I have to give the thumbs up to NAB - I filed the paperwork on Christmas Eve relating to the skimming of my card while I was away, and got the money back today. (This reinforces that, given the choice, a virtual mugging is definitely preferable to a real mugging).

The last run of 2014 won't go down as one of the year's better runs - one of those nights when the back wasn't really playing ball and I couldn't generate much power uphill, which was bad news on a reasonably hilly area (Belmore). Managed to salvage a vaguely respectable run out of it even though I never felt great, even on the downhills. Think route was somewhat suboptimal on a night which was at the long end of the usual Summer Series range.

Not a huge turnout, not surprising given the date. Not sure what is normal because I was otherwise engaged at a certain wedding the last time 31 December fell on a Wednesday. Another turnout which isn't looking great is that of internationals to the World Cup, which is rather disappointing (although the number of non-World Cup overseas entrants is good). Apart from us and NZ, only Sweden and Switzerland are sending close to full teams.

And so ends 2014, probably a similar year to 2013 in competitive terms. One positive was a lack of major injuries, with no layoffs longer than a few days (although in-race injuries cut short two of the big races for the year, the Six Foot Track and the North American Championships); the back was again troublesome from time to time but probably less frequently than in 2013. The brain-fade at WMOC was frustrating though illness would have hurt my final chances anyway. Some good signs towards the end of the year; we'll see how things go at Oceania.

Best race of the year: probably the Eureka Challenge with its course-long scrap with (a subpar) Brodie - presumably the last time this will happen.

Most enjoyable race of the year: the long day of QB3 at Sappa Bulga.

Training run of the year: almost inevitably this year, it was an overseas one - my nomination going to the long run at El Calafate (especially its second half). Honourable mentions to the intervals session a few days earlier in the national park visitors centre car park at El Chalten, the Thursday session two days after I got home, and going back a bit further, the year's longest run, the 36k at Port Fairy in February.

I competed this year in 7 countries (which isn't a PB), and trained in 15, which is. (This is more countries than I officially entered - it includes a bike session in the gym while in transit in Dubai airport - and takes in every continent except Antarctica).

I think it's been a pretty reasonable year for orienteering in Australia, with indications of further growth in participation (though we don't have final numbers yet), some encouraging results at both WOC and JWOC level, and well-run major events. Personally, it's often been a turbulent year, especially on the work front - one of the nice things about going away was not having to open the paper and wonder what half-truths and untruths were being told about me or my work today. (I sometimes have to remind myself that it's only 10%, and not 98%, of the population that believe such nonsense). Still more positives than negatives, and certainly the last couple of months will stay with me for a long time.

Fitness test run at the Tuesday night street-O at Kensington, one of the more interesting areas out there. (Having committed to this meant missing the last few overs of the Test, though as it turned out I didn't miss much). Lots of route choice options and I didn't get the best of them, but reasonably happy with the way the run went - a few minor twinges in various places but definitely better than the weekend. Will see how going harder tomorrow works out.

Last time the nationals were in Queensland, which is more than six years ago, there was a story in the news about one Ron Owen, a (then) Gympie councillor and nationally notorious firearms enthusiast, being ordered to apologise to the (probably minuscule) homosexual community of Gympie following an anti-vilification case. He's spent the last six years going as far as the High Court trying to avoid having to deliver said apology (one wonders who's been paying the legal bills, although the fact that one of his legal representatives is a former staffer for the current Queensland Attorney-General may offer a hint), and was in the news again yesterday for launching a (verbal) attack of the "what's she doing out of the kitchen" variety on the head of the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal which was responsible for the apology order in the first place. We await developments.

(The tribunal did dismiss another complaint, finding that he could not be held responsible for a bumper sticker that read “The only right gays have is the right to die”, because the car was registered in someone else's name, presumably his wife's).

C • Out of the kitchen? 1

Session at Fitzroy on the way to the MCG, taking a precautionary day off running - will try it out tomorrow. Fairly standard as these things go.

I've noticed that I'm first starter, at 9.00, in the (elite) Oceania Middle (which at least means I don't need to worry too much about quarantine). The next Oceania-eligible runner isn't until 9.10 and the first ones whom I'd consider highly likely to beat me (like Prong and Bruce) are around 9.30, so with a decent run I might get to enjoy a half-hour or so in a notional WOC spot...

Started this morning with plans of doing something long, but left hamstring again suspect - runnable, but enough to feel as if it was a bit awkward to run on, and didn't seem like it was going to warm up. Less than a week out from a race week there didn't seem to be any point in taking risks with it - will give it a couple of days to settle down. The Aqueduct will need to wait another day.

Not a great one today by the standards of the last couple of weeks, which is another way of saying that it was more typical of this year. Felt a bit creaky and left hamstring a little tight at times. Have a big one planned tomorrow so will want to be right for that.

En route, took a look at a development at the back of the Ivanhoe shops that my parents had noticed an ad for, but (a) they haven't removed the old buildings on the site yet so I'd be surprised if the new building is ready this side of 2017 and (b) some of the advertising (not least the name) suggests the primary target market is Chinese investors, which means it will probably be flashy-looking but built on the cheap - not the sort of place I'd be interested in long-term.

Most of the rest of the day was spent at the MCG with family commitments out of the way. Ended up in the top deck of the Southern Stand almost behind the bowler's arm - a great spot if your eyesight is decent. My neighbours were friendly and knowledgeable (and one of them had a phone app for Shakespearean curses, which reminded me very much of someone I went to school with), though one of them was also the most obese person I think I've ever been in close company with which made things a bit uncomfortable (he had two seats but it wasn't really enough). Not enough readers of yesterday's Age to get a chant going of "we love Shikhar 'cos he's a Victorian". (It was reported there that Shikhar Dhawan is married to an Indian-Australian and lives in Narre Warren in between cricketing engagements).

Speaking of cricket, there's a World Cup game (Australia-Sri Lanka) at the SCG on the Sunday afternoon after the NOL races in March. Anyone up for it? (assuming there are still tickets).

Woke up pretty stiff this morning, which was no surprise - wouldn't have fancied a run today (the first couple of kilometres would have been tough). The main objective of this session was to get that stiffness out, and in that I was largely successful - making use of the pool at my aunt's place in Blairgowrie. Lots of squally showers overnight but they stopped just before I started and didn't return.

From there it was on to other engagements - not the MCG as you might expect, but my grandmother's 90th, a milestone I'll certainly be happy to reach. The MCG will get some visits over the coming days.

I suspect that if you did an average of amount of training by date then 25 December would come out almost on top for me. I've gone long a disproportionate number of times on this day (partly because Boxing Day is a more awkward one for me), most memorably in 1994 - my first year in Melbourne - where I completely misjudged the distance of my loop and ended up topping 40k. This is the seventh successive year in which I've either run or ridden 2 hours or more on Christmas Day.

This year it was a later run than usual, because it suited family logistics best for me to run from home to Albert Park and arrive in time for lunch - going via Studley Park, across the ridge and then along the river and then the southern edge of the Domain. First half was very good, quickly settling into the sort of mode that I've reached a few times since coming home.

It started to feel like all was not quite well around 15k going around the Richmond bend, although at that stage my pace hadn't changed. Took on some additional water at 19k but by then I was fading quite badly, and the last few kilometres were a significant struggle - certainly didn't feel as if I had much left in me at all in the last kilometre or two, which was traversing very familiar ground - a common route home for me in the 1994-98 years. Could have been hydration issues on a morning which was a bit warmer than I had expected (24), but I think it was more not having eaten enough - not an affliction one normally associates with Christmas Day.

Felt pretty wiped out for most of the rest of the day.

Christmas Eve marked my return to street-O after last week's false start. This one was at Heatherdale, an area I can't remember having run on before - have been on the west side of Mitcham Road plenty of times but not the east. Question and answer format which was a bit different - I seemed to handle writing answers on the run better than some, albeit with a standard of handwriting at five-year-old-letter-to-Santa level.

Thought it was going to be a rough night when my back was dodgy through the uphill first kilometre, but got going after a couple of kilometres - never felt particularly good but was happy with the pace. Ended up only 1 second/km outside my fastest from last year (or the year before), a good launching pad for my first run of the season on a reasonably hilly area (and not having done a race of any description since early November).

I dropped 4 and 15 in the middle; some of the others got 15 and dropped one of the last few. Didn't seem to be much in it. Probably spent as much time talking Argentine football as route choices - one of the people just behind me was wearing a River Plate top.

First session on the old loop since I got back. The sparkle has disappeared for now, perhaps because my sleep is back on normal patterns and I was therefore feeling rather sleepy on this run, especially early on. 10.47 was as good as it got. More humid still with dewpoints near 20 - still not Darwin material but getting closer.

The traffic is disappearing - clearest ride in for a long time today (and first time for a while that I've done it in under 50 minutes, without pushing too hard).

It was reported today that, according to figures collated by the relevant industry body, Northcote is the home to the greatest number of Australian country and western musicians. Our Northcote residents may be able to report on whether they've noticed this.

Back to 2014 normality, in the form of a pretty uninspired Monday morning run up the Merri Creek from near Fitzroy Pool. Sort of got going eventually. Humid by the standards I've experienced recently with dewpoints in the mid-teens, something I haven't seen since Buenos Aires (Darwin and north Queensland readers are invited to start laughing now).

First swim since Brazil. Not sure that I really remembered how to do this but did manage to pick up a little bit in the closing stages (and don't seem to have come out too much the worse for wear afterwards). Spent much of the time thinking somewhat apprehensively about potential implications of the ministerial reshuffle - while the weeks before going away were unpleasant, they were less so than they would have been with a less supportive ministerial boss (and chief of staff), and we've lost them now with the replacement something of an unknown quantity. (At the very least, we can look forward to another barrage of attacks as our opponents try their luck with new political bosses).

Finally got to the end of reading and sorting something like 3800 e-mails today, although doing something with those that need doing something with is still in its early stages.

Out at Mount Alexander with Bruce, in the name of getting my orienteering back into some sort of gear (both from the navigation and terrain running point of view). This was based on the Easter course - for me, starting at 4, continuing to 15 (including the loops), then 15-22-1 and on to 4.

It was a bit of a shock to the system initially - rather stiff and tight, and lots of the less attractive features of Australian summer orienteering, such as grass seeds (and assorted other bits of vegetation which come with you for a ride) and spider webs. (It turned out these were worse in the first and last 200 metres than anywhere else on the course). As in 2013, couldn't run a lot of the epic climb 5-6-7. Settled down after that; never flowing especially well (more so technically than physically), though pace was fairly similar to 2013 which I was happy with given that I wasn't racing. Surprised to catch up to Bruce (who started a couple of minutes ahead of me) at 15 but he'd had a few photo stops. Fine navigation seemed OK, although with no flags out it's hard to be absolutely sure.

Hottest day I've experienced for a while; mid-high 20s during the run, and eventually topped out at 34. Handled this better than I thought I might given the cool/cold conditions I've experienced for most of the last month.

Felt a few tight and sore spots today - Achilles not quite right, and didn't seem to be flowing as smoothly as at times the last couple of days, but still a decent run. For no obvious reason my training pace seems to have come down 10-15 seconds/km since coming home with no discernable change of effort; maybe the Patagonian training camp has had some effect. (I am a couple of kilos down on where I was before leaving, so obviously didn't indulge too much in the empanadas and dulce de leche, and the pack-carrying probably wouldn't have done my strength any harm, either).

Headed out as far as the Finns Reserve bridge, taking in Appleblossom Ct, Viewbank on the way. Next one is about as far out as it gets.

First time at Fitzroy Pool for a while, with the usual company still there. Quite a nice session despite an interrupted night (an 11.30pm teleconference is not ideal when you're trying to get yourself back on sync after a long trip).

Last weekend was a big weekend for celebrating successful campaigns in this area - there were posters outside for last Saturday's street party to celebrate the (presumed) stopping of the East-West Link, and banners inside the pool (including what looked like a few of the original demo banners) for last Sunday's 20th anniversary celebration of the Save Fitzroy pool campaign (a reminder that I've now been in Melbourne for more than 20 years).

The ride in gave the chance to assess progress (or sometimes the absence thereof) on various bits of construction or deconstruction. Will need to put a bit more air in the tyres before I venture out again. Not as crazy around the Queen Vic Markets as I would have expected for the last Friday morning before Christmas. The signs outside Etihad Stadium said that international darts is coming soon to the stadium; I'm shattered that it clashes with the Oceania events in Tasmania.

Lunchtime on the Tan - not something I'd usually do on a Friday, but then I don't usually have a Tuesday rest day. Some tightness in the groin area early on (possibly due to working some muscles on the bike when I hadn't been on a bike for three months), but that loosened quickly and it settled into a nice run. I seem to be in a bit of a good patch at the moment; hopefully I can keep it going for a while.

It's good to be reminded of the qualities of the local talent in some parts of our wide brown land - something I saw today in my catching-up (though it's a couple of months old):

"A disqualified driver who allegedly drank five beers while on a high-speed police pursuit with an unrestrained six-year-old child in the back seat, told police he consumed the beers during the chase to “calm me down and stop me doing something stupid”.

(The driver was from Dubbo but his appearance was in the Orange Local Court, so I'm guessing the pursuit was between the two).

I'm sure South America has lots of talentless local talent of its own, but I didn't get to see any of it reported in the papers. (In any case, in a country like Brazil which has on average a murder every 10 minutes, hapless petty criminals probably aren't going to get much of a run on the news).

Started promisingly and became much more promising as it went on, culminating in an in-the-zone second half where I was floating for most of it. Not really the occasion when you'd expect to have a very good run, but it's not the first time I've had a very good run a day or two after doing a long-haul trip. Perhaps not quite as inspiring a setting as El Calafate, but was turning in similar numbers in the second half on a section which was flat rather than downhill. This is now the third very good long run second half I've had in the last five weeks, which is highly encouraging. Just tired a little in the last 10-15 minutes.

The alphabetical sequence is resumed: Apex Way, Montmorency (a short link between two streets which has only one building on it). I had a second target too but had slightly misremembered its location, so that will have to wait for the weekend. Once Montmorency was out of the way I headed down to Westerfolds Park for the first time in a while, then back more or less along the river.

I'd started with 1.45 as the plan, but was happy to stretch it out a bit. It wasn't until late in the piece that I remembered that I'd started my (normal) watch after 6 minutes (after getting a battery warning on the Garmin I decided to save it for the mostly off-road second half), so it was going to be 2 hours or close to it after all. Was pretty happy with that.

Plan tonight was Eastern Summer Series at Tunstall Junction but it didn't quite work out that way - perhaps not surprisingly, after not seeing any action for the best part of three months, the car wouldn't start (though the RACV person later in the evening said the battery was at the end of its life and would have failed soon regardless), and I was already cutting it fairly fine on time so didn't have time for a plan B.

In truth I didn't really feel up for a fast run tonight so wasn't desperately upset by the outcome. Felt better once I was actually running, but still pretty slow. Spent part of the run exploring the Banyule riverside singletrack (often too muddy to be pleasant in winter); it's got a big tree across it now which the MTBers haven't yet moved (or put a new track around). Had a much-needed massage this morning and am already sensing the benefits.

Didn't feel as if I achieved an awful lot at work today, other than sifting through the first 1300 of 3000-odd e-mails. Quite a number of the 3000-odd e-mails pertained to a run of bike thefts from the parking area at work, and suggestions of varying degrees of practicality for doing something about it. I notice that the main action so far has been the appearance of a plethora of signs (though not yet one saying "Beware Of The Leopard"); there's even one with the phone number of the National Security Hotline. I wouldn't have thought that the Bureau bike sheds were a particularly strong candidate for a terrorist attack, but then I guess before this week you wouldn't have said that a chocolate shop was either.

C • Battery 3

Reasonably straightforward flight home, with the assistance of an upgrade (thanks again to Dad's mountain of points, and a route that doesn't get a lot of business traffic at this time of year). The main thing I was interested in was whether we'd get as far south as Antarctica; the answer was not quite, but close enough to see sea ice (similar story to last year's Johannesburg trip). Half-hour delays both in and out of Sydney (the connection would have been a bit tight for comfort had I had the former but not the latter), and eventually got home about 11.

One of the things I was doing on the plane was reformatting late 1990s/early 2000s NOL results so they're ready for the new website. Noticed some other interesting results in that process too, such as lazydave smashing Jules by 7 minutes in M14 in the 1999 NSW Championships.

C • Easter result? 1

C • Welcome Home 1

C • Smashed him! 1

Santiago was the last leg of the journey, and this was the last run. I was staying near the main metropolitan park (not by coincidence), which contains a high hill with several communications towers and a big statue of the Virgin Mary. My original thoughts were to go around the base, given the hard day yesterday, but that wasn't really an option so this one was another long climb (though not as steep as yesterday's). Not terribly sparkling - hadn't slept that well (whether subconsciously absorbing the goings-on at home or not, I'm not sure) - but happy with the way I came up in the muscular sense with no signs of the sore quads which I thought might have been the result of yesterday. Nice cool morning; even yesterday's mid-20s is the warmest I've experienced since Mendoza, which makes me think readjusting once home could be interesting.

Plenty of cyclists taking on the hill, as you'd expect. Santiago's cyclists are not exactly lacking in hill-climbing opportunities - while the bulk of the city is flat apart from isolated hills (old volcanic plugs?), big mountains rise just out of town and I don't think you'd have to go too far away to find road climbs of 2000m vertical or more (Santiago is at 600m and the ski resorts nearby are mostly in the mid- to upper 2000s, with the pass to Mendoza a bit over 3000).

Wandering around the central city (lots of Christmas shopping crowds) in the late afternoon/evening yesterday was pleasant enough without suggesting that I'd made a mistake in making Valparaiso my higher priority of the weekend.

It took until my last night in South America before the first time that I was on the end of an attempt at petty scamming, in the form of a restaurant that calculated a 10% service charge as an amount which actually worked out to 28%. They probably should have tried to pull that one on someone a bit less numerate.

And here the trip ends; I'm about to get on the plane home. If things go to plan my next run will be Eastern Summer Series at Tunstall Junction.

C • Last 'task' 2

C • Stray Dogs 2

Probably not enough fine detail for a sprint, but Valparaiso would be an epic place for a long-form urban race - heaps of hills and streets winding everywhere. (Looks like some decent forest - mix of pine and eucalypt plantations - in the area inland from there, too).

In Valparaiso. As I mentioned yesterday, this is definitely not a flat city - from a narrow coastal plain a few hundred metres across, a steep range of hills rise up with the city stretching to the top of them - the geography has a little bit in common with Wellington (except that even the steepest bits that have been left alone in Wellington are built on here). Not sure how high the range is but I'd guess 400-500m.

My initial target was the top of said range. I didn't think the bits of my body which take a while to warm up would appreciate hitting it cold, so started with a flat-to-downhill initial loop before starting the climb about 2km in. From there it was a 35-minute climb with only a couple of brief flats, getting me to the highest parts of the city - it was a slightly murky morning but the view was still worth it. (I had thought from the description of the event that this might take me into some of the areas affected by the fire earlier this year, in which about 2500 properties and 15 lives were lost, but it didn't).

The first attempt at coming off the range went into a slum which I didn't feel comfortable in (and wasn't sure I'd be able to get out of at the bottom anyway). The second attempt made it clear immediately that there were much steeper ways of taking on the hills than the way I'd climbed it - it took only 2k to lose most of the height it took 5.5k to gain. That put me onto a road which contours around for a while at about the 100-metre level, which was nice, before dropping down onto the flats. Thought I might be a bit short of 2 hours when climbing back to where I was staying but was enjoying myself enough to add an extra loop to take it up to that mark.

Certainly happy with the way I handled the big climb - no issues, just steady grinding without feeling like I was struggling. Quads were a bit iffy after the major descent but settled down again and were fine later in the run (though we'll see how they come up tomorrow).

Valparaiso is an interesting, gloriously chaotic place - all manner of building styles spread over the hills and lots of street life. Definitely glad I came out here rather than spend the weekend in Santiago.

Because English-speakers most commonly associate the word with military dictatorships (most infamously here), it seemed a bit odd to see signs erected on behalf of various juntas. In fact it just means a board or committee (I think the ones I was seeing were community associations).

Headed to Santiago in the afternoon, the last stop of the trip.

Morning run in Santiago, a bit later than has been usual of late - slept in a bit after the long day yesterday. Thought I might have been raring to go after the unplanned rest day yesterday but it didn't quite work out like that (perhaps I was still hungry?) - a bit of a struggle though perhaps a little improved later. Back was playing up a bit mid-run, in a area which was dead flat. Not sure how it will respond tomorrow in Valparaiso, which is definitely not flat.

I was staying a bit west of the city centre. Feared the worst in the traffic department after having to cross a six-lane highway in the first 200 metres, but the rest was fine (it might be a bit less fine at a similar time on Monday, which is why I've chosen my Sunday night accommodation to be as close to parks as possible). Headed initially for the Quinta Normal park, mostly in the name of seeing what "Santiago Q. Normal" stands for on international meteorological reports (didn't find the site, though), then aimed for the river (such as it is) but never quite got there.

More old buildings around than I've been used to seeing in Chilean cities, mainly because, unlike pretty much everywhere between here and Puerto Montt, Santiago hasn't been flattened by an earthquake at one or more points in the last 100 years (the 2010 quake, centred further south, caused widespread, but mostly light to moderate, damage here).

With not much time left, the advice from everyone I'd spoken to was that Valparaiso (90 minutes away on the coast) was worth more of my time than Santiago, so it was to Valparaiso that I headed in the middle of the day.

C • Valparaiso 5

Today was always going to be spent more or less entirely on the bus - the last long haul (on land) of this trip, up to Santiago. I'd picked out the bus I wanted several days ago, as it was the only route that did a daytime trip from Puerto Varas to Santiago by day, meaning that (a) I could see things (one of the objects of the exercise) and (b) I didn't have to backtrack to Puerto Montt.

The biggest challenge, by far, for this was getting the ticket. In general it is difficult or impossible - and in Chile it appears to be impossible - for foreigners to buy bus tickets online in this part of the world (you usually need to enter a local ID card number), so you need to find a company office - a challenge in places which aren't big enough to have a proper bus station (in Chile, except in the larger cities, buses normally depart from the street near the company office). Attempt 1 was in Punta Arenas where the Pullman website gave 2 addresses. Number 1 was for a different bus company who presumably used to sell Pullman tickets but don't any more, number 2 was closed for the day. Attempt 2 was in Puerto Varas. The address from the website was a car park which looked like it used to be a bus station but wasn't any more. The tourist office eventually pointed me to the right place, which turned out to be an ordinary house with an annex with no company logos, but a few printed notices with timetables suggesting it was probably the Pullman office, and another sign saying it was open from 9 to 1 in the mornings, but at 10.30 there was no-one to be seen.

Attempt 3 was in Osorno but I couldn't find the bus station (this was the fruitless half-hour mentioned in yesterday's entry). It turned out I'd been led a bum steer by the normally reliable South American Handbook, a remarkable publication which, in terms of the density of information contained therein and its long history, published annually since 1924 (to say nothing of its paper thickness and font size...) resembles Wisden. (I did think it a bit strange that somewhere described as '4 blocks from the centre' had an address with the number 1400 - in most of the places I've been to here, as is common in North America, addresses use block numbers, normally starting from 0 in the centre)). I eventually succeeded fourth time lucky with a diversion into Puerto Montt (so I did go into town after all) on my way to drop the car back to the airport.

With that saga completed, I still wasn't entirely confident of seeing a bus in the appointed place at the appointed time, but it did turn up. It was very comfortable and there were often good views once early cloud cleared (more volcanoes at regular intervals), but there was one small problem - no food and no stops to get any, which meant that lunch consisted of a muesli bar and some leftover bits of chocolate from the Torres del Paine expedition. We finally got into Santiago about 10.30pm; you won't be surprised to learn that after dumping my bags I was straight out the door to the second-nearest restaurant (the nearest was McDonald's - I wasn't that desperate).

I had hoped to squeeze a run in early this morning, but discovered that the front door was locked and there wasn't an obvious way to get out at that time of the morning (something which means the place will get a suitably scathing review from me, which is a pity because everything else about it was good - apart from the nuisance it's a serious fire hazard, though I guess if you had to you could get out through the part of the building that the owners live in). Wasn't that upset about missing a token-gesture run, more that if I'd known I could have slept an extra 45 minutes....

Long run from Puerto Varas. Started with a bit of a loop of the town trying and failing to find the relevant bus company office in preparation for tomorrow's departure, then along the lake east of town - this is a main road but has a separated bike lane once beyond the town limits. Perfect morning for it, crisp and no wind (first time I've said that for a while), and responded with a pretty good run, at its best in the last few kilometres. Left hamstring a bit iffy from time to time (but the time away from running while on the trek seems to have settled my Achilles down).

Today's principal sightseeing mission was to view Volcan Puyehue, the one which caused me (and various others) a certain amount of grief back in 2011. (The eruption was actually from a side vent, Cordon Caulle). This is about 180km from Puerto Varas through generally nice country, and it was suitably photogenic when I got there (despite some cloud). The trip itself had a mixture of the good (the scenery), the bad (spending at least an hour of the day stuck at various lots of roadworks) and the ugly (spending half an hour battling Osorno's traffic on the way back without finding what I was looking for).

We're far enough north to be a little bit back into the mainstream - in the last day or so I've seen my first electric fence since Mendoza (surprisingly in Puerto Varas, a place which shows no other evidence whatsoever of being a crime-prone spot) and my first slum since Buenos Aires (less surprisingly on the fringes of Puerto Montt). Still waiting for the first sighting of golden arches since Bariloche (maybe NZ does possess the furthest south of these after all?).

C • McDonalds 2

Another early one, this time in Punta Arenas before the flight to Puerto Montt. Once again along a waterfront, mainly in the name of traffic avoidance (coming into town yesterday was the first traffic jam I've seen since the special case of the blockade between Mendoza and Neuquen), though at this hour there wasn't much traffic to avoid. There was, instead, a distinctly Punta Arenas feature - the rope along the footpath to hold onto in high winds (not needed today, but would have been over the weekend).
Northern waterfront features included a set of open-air basketball courts - presumably with a slightly lower standard of play than the Venice Beach equivalents (though three-point shots in the wind must be interesting).

I turned around a bit before the naval base. Chile is obviously still getting the hang of this democracy thing because the sign at the base entrance (seen later in the morning) listed the security threat level as "None" on a scale from "None" to "High" - obviously no-one's told them yet that they're supposed to beat up trivial threats into something not too far short of several divisions of the Third Reich massed on the borders. Given local history and the personal history of some of the government - Chile, like Brazil and (until last week) Uruguay, has a President who knows what the inside of a torture chamber looks like - one imagines that security forces aren't taken on trust quite as much in this part of the world as they are in some others.

The run was pretty good, especially in sections where the crosswind wasn't too acute.

The flight (45 minutes late because of a luggage belt breakdown) was a bit of a change after about 11,000km on land (or water). It was also the most spectacular route I can remember flying despite scattered cloud, taking in all the highlights of my last couple of weeks early on, and then plenty more in the remaining 90 minutes.

My mission upon arrival in Puerto Montt, an unlovely city in a lovely region, was to get out of it as quickly as possible. (In fact I never really went into it, skirting around its fringes). I noted a few days ago that it was the subject of one of Lonely Planet's increasingly rare scathing assessments - to quote:

"Puerto Montt's most redeeming quality is that of its plethora of exit points: be it by plane, ferry, bus or rental car, you can make a quick and virtually painless getaway to a near-endless inventory of memorable locales. Otherwise, travellers have occasionally become endeared of the unpolished working-class Chilean atmosphere here".

Working-class Chilean atmospheres not being the highest priority of my remaining time here, I picked up a car at the airport and headed for the lakes, with the nearby town of Puerto Varas (on a big lake with a spectacular volcano overlooking it) as my base for the next couple of nights. It turned out that Peter Taylor is here for a workshop and had the afternoon off, so I picked him up and we spent the rest of the day exploring (and my first experience of South American driving wasn't too scary, though Chile is sedate compared with some of its neighbours in that respect).

C • Puerto Varas + Puerto Montt 2

C • Streak 1

Early start in Puerto Natales, which I thought might have been a test given the late finish last night - felt a bit sleepy at times but otherwise not too bad. Decided that south along the shoreline was the direction to go (despite its exposing me to an icy crosswind). Started out keeping pace with the Navimag ferry as it was leaving port (this is a three-day trip ending up at Puerto Montt, which if it is on time - by no means a given on this run - will get into Puerto Montt around the same time that I'm leaving the area on Friday), but its acceleration was eventually sufficient for it to pull away from me.

The turnaround point was a small lighthouse. I presume it has a name but my Spanish has developed to the point where I recognised that what was on the sign next to the lighthouse was not its name - otherwise I might have recorded that today's run extended from Puerto Natales to Rubbish Dumping Prohibited and back. (It must be said that observance of said prohibition was evidently somewhat incomplete).

Main activity for the day, before getting the afternoon bus down to Punta Arenas (the least comfortable one I've been on in two months, but at least it was only three hours), was to visit the Cueva del Milodon, a series of caves where interesting fossils have been found (and the caves are quite interesting in their own right). This is the end of the Bruce Chatwin trail - these caves were his ultimate goal. (I read his book many years ago and have almost completely forgotten it, but it appeared to be popular reading on the trail, in numerous languages). The fossils are ancient but the "rock art" is very recent - barring the unlikely scenario that the word "fuck" is actually of indigenous Patagonian origin (brought back to Europe by Magellan's sailors?).

There were three plans for today. Plan A (good weather) was to do the Valle del Frances as an out-and-back with a day pack from Paine Grande. Plan B (mediocre weather) was to do the western leg to Refugio Grey and see the glacier (the original plan for today when I was planning to do Frances yesterday). Plan C (weather as bad as yesterday) was to get the early boat back and bail out to Puerto Natales early.

The day dawned bright (though with plenty of new snow on the ground above 800m or so), so plan A it was, and it was definitely worth it - getting up into a magnificent mountain valley with glaciated peaks all around. I'd had contradictory reports over whether I was actually supposed to be up there (a sign said no, a ranger earlier said yes), but was glad I did (and plenty of others had the same idea). Definitely a good note to end the trek on. The last 3km (repeating the same section as yesterday) was definitely a lot more pleasant than yesterday...

Having less weight to carry definitely makes a difference - today was the longest day by some margin (26km) but felt the easiest.

Got the late boat out, which when everything else was said and done, meant not getting back to Puerto Natales until about 10.30 (without any chance to eat in the interim). I'm not used to being the last person left in a restaurant as it's about to close.

Torres del Paine was definitely a spectacular experience (and the experience wouldn't have been complete without at least one bit of exposure to really foul weather). Didn't quite do everything I wanted to do, but a more than sufficient percentage to be satisfied.

C • Rifugios 2

The forecast for today was dismal - marginally less windy than yesterday but with rain expected to fall most of the day. Forecasts here have a poor reputation but if you know which things you can rely on and which things you can't, you can get a lot out of them.

Original plan for today was to do 5km along the base, drop pack, do an out-and-back up the Frances valley and then the next 8km to Paine Grande. Given the conditions I was having misgivings about this - the cloud was lowish and there didn't seem much point in going up the valley if there wasn't going to be much to see - but in the end the rangers made the decision for me by closing the valley track. This meant another short day and lunchtime finish; I'd set out early on the basis that the conditions were only likely to get worse.

The conditions weren't too bad for the first part - fairly light rain, and modest winds after the first couple of kilometres, helped by the fact that the Frances valley also generates a northerly outflow which offsets the general southwesterlies. Not the most photogenic of days so pressed on fairly quickly.

I was just starting to think that I was going to get through this without too many dramas when I saw a 2.5km to go sign (slightly misplaced as it happened - probably more like 3). A few minutes later I crested a ridge and got the full force - unobstructed westerlies, probably close to 100 km/h, and horizontal, heavy rain. With temperatures probably around 6-7 it's fairly close to the worst conditions I've ever been out in. My raingear wasn't really up to the job (though I'm not sure if much would be up to those conditions), and I was certainly happy to get through that section and get inside the buildings at Paine Grande - it was sufficiently bad that I think another hour out in those conditions and I could have been in trouble.

Paine Grande is accessible by boat and is not exactly your regular mountain hut (and includes people with gear I wouldn't have considered essential bushwalking equipment, like a hairdryer).

Most unexpected moment: being asked by a Chilean mountain guide how the State of Origin ended up this year. (He'd done a trip out to Australia during his off-season to walk the Hume and Hovell Track - I guess you travel to experience things you wouldn't at home - and found himself watching Game 1 in a Tumbarumba pub).

The configuration of the refugios meant there was always going to be one short day, either today or tomorrow. I had been thinking about doing the out-and-back up the Valle del Frances as an add-on today, but that wasn't an option as you're only allowed to start up there in the mornings. (I'm not sure why, but given that it's light until after 10pm, I wonder if it's because daytime glacial melt makes the stream crossings problematic in the afternoons?).

Not as many people out today - yesterday's route is a feasible walk for those only visiting for the day, but only the multi-day walkers were on today's route, which is essentially a "transport" leg around the southern edge of the range. There's still enough that you see people regularly ('Ola' is the standard initial greeting, though I suspect Spanish speakers are in the minority). There's a reasonable number of Americans and Europeans (you hear French quite a bit), and a few from our part of the world. (Having Macpac gear immediately marks you as being from Australia or New Zealand).

The forecast for today was poor (more with respect to winds than rain), so when I got up and saw it was OK, I decided to get the walk over as quickly as possible - with only 13km and not much climbing, that meant I was done by lunchtime. The main interest turned out to be the local winds. The overall wind forecast was for 90 km/h WNW winds, but in the early stages they were actually N/NE - as I was to appreciate, what's happening is that the flow splits in two around the mountain complex. One indication that things were different not too far away was to look at the lake below, and see the swells going in opposite directions on the northern and southern halves of the lake; an indication that things were soon to get far more interesting was the spray visible at the far end of the lake.

I rounded a spur and hit the southwesterlies on the southern branch of the split flow a couple of kilometres before the refugio. They were fierce, and squally (at least seeing the bands of spray on the lake below gave me a few seconds' warning of when a squall was going to hit) - it was difficult to stay standing in the strongest squalls, especially in more exposed areas. Wasn't too upset to spend the afternoon sitting around and admiring the conditions on the lake from a sheltered location. You could also see that there was rain not too far ahead, although it was sunny most of the day where I was (the ranges create a major rainshadow, with averages dropping from 2000mm to 800mm over a distance of 20km).

The squalls got even fiercer in the evening, and eventually broke one of the refugio windows - something which I think would require a gust well into three figures. Glad I wasn't in a tent.

Unlike the other two refugios I stayed at (which are accessible by road and boat respectively), you can only get into Los Cuernos by walking (or riding a horse) at least 12km, which makes for a generally different crowd. Included amongst it, though, was a girl of about 3, which means either she walked 12km or someone carried her 12km - I'm impressed either way. (Someone of my acquaintance did one of the big NZ tracks - the Routeburn, if I recall correctly - at a similar age; he refused to be carried, which was the original plan, and walked every step of it himself).

Start of the Torres del Paine trek. Got the early bus from Puerto Natales out to the park and got there about 10.30.

First stage was to do the walk to the main lookout for the Torres del Paine themselves. This is essentially an out-and-back of about 10km each way, climbing from about 100m to 900. The last 300 is a steep scramble finishing with a crossing of a scree slope - dropped the pack before doing that bit, which made it a lot easier.

There was cloud around and occasional showers (falling as sleet at the highest levels), but enough breaks in it to get a view of all three of the towers (though not all at the same time). They rise almost 2000m sheer from a glacial lake - the viewpoint was on the other side of the lake - which is as spectacular as it sounds. There was a reasonable amount of wind around, though not as fierce as some of the days here.

It's a long time since I've walked (most of) a day with a pack (especially when some steep hills are involved) - not that heavy as packs go (the availability of food at the refugios meant not having to carry as much of that as would be expected for a multi-day walk), though I still carried camping gear as an emergency back-up. Found out about a few muscles which have been under-employed (quads particularly).

Headed out early in the day from Punta Arenas with a target of the hills west of town, setting out into a light rain shower (the first rain I’ve run in since WMOC), which cleared within a few minutes. Through the suburbs for the first bit – exiting town along Avenida Presidente Salvador Allende, which I think can be reasonably assumed to have been renamed at least once in the last 25 years – then onto a dirt road up towards the base of the local ski resort. This was a long and sometimes rather steep climb and pretty hard (and slow) work. Had thought there might be some forest tracks to run on at the far end but the entrance gate to the area was closed, so turned around at that point (would have been another 200 metres or so climb to the top of the hill).

I’d set out with original thoughts of 1.45-2.00, but was struggling a bit today – Achilles never really warmed up, and was starting to feel a bit of hamstring tightness towards the end too, so was happy to call it a day and not do an extra 10-20 minute loop through the suburbs to get the distance up. Hopefully a few days away from running will settle this down a bit. Reasonably happy with the way I ground up the big hill even on a day when things weren’t going smoothly, though I’m well aware that it was less than half the size of the Pluvi…

Moved on to Puerto Natales, the final jumping-off point for Torres del Paine, in the afternoon. Much of the rest of the day was devoted to getting relevant supplies for the trek, not as easy as it looks even though getting bookings in the refugios (huts) means I won’t have to factor in camping (except as an emergency option) or as much cooking – both Punta Arenas and Puerto Natales are full of outdoor shops but most are devoted to clothes rather than other useful items. I head off tomorrow morning and will be out bush for four days, so don’t expect to hear from me in that time. (I’ve occasionally mused on the subject of how many days my AP log would have to go un-updated for without notice before someone reported me missing….).

A sheep was being raffled in the shopping street of Puerto Natales. I didn’t buy a ticket.

There was a certain amount of local pride yesterday with the news that Chile is now ranked by Transparency International as the 21st least corrupt country in the world (only one point behind the US) – certainly every travel guide I’ve read has a comment along the lines of “don’t even think about trying to bribe the police in Chile”. As I don’t plan to go to any other countries from here, this means I should have made it through South America without having to pay anyone any bribes, something I thought might happen at least once (most likely in Paraguay, which was in the leading 20 at the wrong end of the list). Australia’s dropped from its usual top-10 position to 12th; presumably the activities of Eddie Obeid and associates have been unhelpful in this respect.

C • Corruption in OZ 2

Very early start this morning, which meant that the timeslot available for running today was in the evening after arriving in Punta Arenas - thus collecting a new country (Chile).

Thought it might be a bit of a struggle after all day on the bus and without a proper lunch (though living on muesli bars during the day is something I'll be getting used to in the next few days in Torres del Paine) - you can't take fruit, vegetables, meat or dairy products across the border which rules out most of the things one might put in a packed lunch, and you can't buy Chilean pesos (at least officially) in Argentina so I didn't have any money to buy anything on the other side. Had a bit of a scare with foot soreness in the first kilometre, but settled down and it was a reasonable run for the most part, on a fairly easy course along the waterfront. 10 degrees, stratus cloud and not much wind felt like Melbourne in mid-winter (except that it doesn't get dark until 10.30).

This run may yet get immortalised - the Google Street View car went past at one point.

I've seen some mixed reviews for Punta Arenas in its time (John Colls, after being stuck here for a couple of weeks trying to get to Antarctica, described it in the Yarra Valley newsletter as being like spending your holiday in Footscray, which prompted Barry McCrae to stand up for his former 'hood in response). It seems pleasant enough though the central city is a bit dead in the evenings. There's a range of hills to the west which looks like it has potential as a long run target.

(While on the subject of bad reviews, Lonely Planet is no longer as good as it was - probably browbeaten by upset local politicians in various parts of the world - in giving frank assessments of places which aren't worth visiting. In that light, their assessment of Puerto Montt, which I fly into after leaving here, suggests my plan should be to get out of the place as quickly as possible).

The trip from Ushuaia was largely covering ground already covered on Sunday, although at a rather higher speed - our bus driver seemed to be under the impression that Ruta 3 was a one-way street judging by his disregard for the possibility that there might be traffic heading in the opposite direction. We covered the 290km to the border (including some winding mountain roads early on) in just on three hours. It turned out to be pointless as we ended up waiting 90 minutes for the ferry.

As I expected, last night's system ran out of moisture before it could produce any snow in Ushuaia (in fact it was a gorgeous sunny morning). It was clearly very cold overnight inland, though - in the big valley about 25km out of town, there was ice on farm-dam sized ponds by the roadside, which from my Canberra experience means -5 (at least).

C • Punta Arenas 4

This morning's plan was to head up into a valley which goes north into the hills behind Ushuaia (eventually curving west to form the other side of the range immediately behind the city).

The plan was duly executed but the setting wasn't quite what I thought it would be (I'd had some forewarning of this from some reading yesterday). The city's very rapid employment growth in the 1980s and 1990s wasn't matched by the (official) release of new land for housing, which meant that people built anywhere they could (which here, means anything that isn't vertical or a bog) - most of which doesn't appear on maps. The Valle Andorra, with its relatively level base, was a prime example of this. It's not really a shantytown in the normal sense because many of the people who built there would have been people with decent jobs who simply couldn't get formal housing at any price, and many of the houses are substantial real estate (though it gets more rough and ready out the back). At least they have electricity these days.

The city government is now embarking on a 'Plan de Urbanizacion' (i.e. turning these areas into proper suburbs) and, if you believe the signs, putting several tens of millions of pesos into it, but for now, the combination of peak-hour traffic and dirt roads didn't make for a running environment as pleasant as I'd originally anticipated. Further on, the road traffic thinned out but the number of dogs increased to compensate (though all but a couple were well-behaved). Reached the spot where the road ends and the walking track starts to be greeted by a sign which said the track was closed, but by then I was only a couple of minutes short of my planned turnaround time so was happy to turn around, especially as my Achilles was struggling.

Most of the rest of a day of the if-you-don't-like-the-weather-wait-5-minutes variety was spent exploring the national park, the accessible bits of which are focused on the coast west of town (though just because a track is coastal doesn't mean it's flat) - the coastal scenery (still very nice) being a bit of a change in pace from the big glaciated mountains. Some of the trees seemed to be creaking alarmingly but they're regularly exposed to much bigger storms than this so I wasn't too worried about being squashed. Didn't get into the right bits of the park to see the havoc wrought by beavers, introduced mid-century in a seemed-like-a-good-idea-at-the-time scheme to develop a fur industry and now a major pest.

Spotted a remark today from someone to the effect that he wouldn't want his teenage daughter anywhere near legislation proposed by the Sex Party (who may or may not have the balance of power in the Victorian Upper House). Teenage daughters have a long and honourable history in Victorian political discourse and it's probably about time they made a return appearance (although the previous example turned out to be well into her 20s).

Did a bit more reading on the 1978-79 Beagle Channel dispute. It seems that Argentina's military made plans (which became public after the fall of the dictatorship) for a full-scale invasion of Chile - meanwhile inviting Peru and Bolivia, both of whom had century-old grievances of their own with Chile, to join the party. They apparently thought they could take Santiago in a few days (which if nothing else demonstrates that 1982 wasn't the first time they made a highly ambitious assessment of their own military capabilities).

One of the Argentine generals of the time created quite a stir many years later by saying that if the war had actually happened (it's still debated whether any troops actually crossed the border before the invasion was called off), Chile would have won it. Apart from anything else, one imagines the US would have got involved (if only to restore the status quo ante); while the Pinochet regime had become something of an embarrassment to its erstwhile American backers by 1978 (their blowing up Allende's foreign minister in a Washington DC street was unhelpful in this respect), and in any case under Jimmy Carter the US was starting to get out of the business of backing any dictator who could demonstrate a sufficient detestation of Commies, a general war in South America certainly wouldn't have been in US interests.

All that said, the Argentine grievance was legitimate - Chilean control of the disputed islands and their territorial waters left the port of Ushuaia without usable access to the open sea. (The settlement eventually brokered by the Pope involved Chile retaining the islands but the waters being declared international).

These days the two countries seem to get on fine (except in football). The old rule that democracies never go to war with each other (or the variation, that two countries with a McDonald's never go to war with each other) was a casualty of the various 1990s conflicts in the former Yugoslavia, but still holds more often than not, and certainly all the heat went out of this dispute once the two countries became democratic. (Actually, it's exceedingly rare these days for two countries to go to war with each other anywhere these days; conflict takes other forms).

Some further reading (this time, on the webpage of the international campaign to ban land mines) revealed that, after some initial foot-dragging (possibly because deep down they didn't lose too much sleep over the odd splattered smuggler), Chile is about halfway through the task of clearing its old minefields, though it's expected to take them until 2020 or thereabouts to finish the job. I'm guessing that Tierra del Fuego, where they don't pose much of a threat to anything except the odd errant sheep, is a fair way down the priority list.

10x1 minute in a park at the west end of central Ushuaia - half gently uphill, half gently downhill. This (to be precise, the end point of the even-numbered reps) set a new PB for run furthest south, which will probably not be surpassed (at least on this trip) as my plans for tomorrow involve going north(ish). Decent conditions with not much wind. Session itself was reasonably mundane - not as lively as last week's equivalent.

The major activity for the day was to go up to the vicinity of the Glacier Martial, in the mountains immediately behind the town (the highest peak is at about 1300 metres with the glacier base at around 850). I didn't quite get to the glacier base because getting there would have required crossing a section of 45-degree snow slope which I wasn't comfortable doing on my own without equipment, but still got to take in the spectacular views, both of the town from above and the mountains from below. My timing was also good - after a partly cloudy but dry period with high cloud bases, it started raining just as I was finishing a post-walk hot chocolate at the cafe at the bottom, and closed in for most of the rest of the day.

Warm-up and down. Decided on the way out to check out the place from where my bus on Wednesday is supposed to be leaving (Ushuaia doesn't really have a bus station and most buses leave from outside the relevant company office). It was as well that I did - it turns out that the bus company office moved last week, and (as I confirmed later in the day), so has the place the bus leaves from.