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Training Log Archive: bill_l

In the 1 days ending Jun 24, 2010:

activity # timemileskm+mload
  Walking3 4:45:00 13.0(21:55) 20.92(13:37)490.0
  Run1 2:32:25 4.14(36:49) 6.66(22:53) 112347.5
  Total4 7:17:25 17.14(25:31) 27.59(15:51) 112837.5
averages - sleep:7

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Th

Thursday Jun 24, 2010 #

6 AM

Run 2:32:25 intensity: (1:59:01 @2) + (24:10 @3) + (9:14 @4) 4.14 mi (36:49 / mi) +112m 33:58 / mi
ahr:105 max:149

Quite possibly the MOST beautiful setting for a run that I've ever done. Cerrtainly my favorite run of all time.
6AM in the Old Faithful Geyser Basin.

About 30F (there was frost on the grass and ice on the boardwalk in places). Parts of the boardwalk at Old Faithful are wood and parts are Trex. Icy Trex is slicker than snot.

I had the place virtually to myself.

With the cold temp, all of the steam vents were clearly visible. Quite surreal.

Was lucky enough to catch Old Faithful from the top of Observation Hill. I think a total of 9 people witnessed this particlar eruption (in contrast to the 100's or 1000's that gather around the boardwalk later in the day).

A bit later, ran into (not literally) a volunteer spotter (these people are a little nutty but more on that later) near Grand Geyser. He said Grand might erupt soon, but almost certainly within the next hour.

Grand Geyser is the largest predictable geyser in the world and was #1 on Benjamin's must see list while in the OF geyser basin. It erupts every 10-14 hours. There are certain telltale signs that indicate whether an eruption is immenent and the signs occur 18 minutes apart just prior to said eruption. Spotter said I had about 7 minutes until the next eruption window so I ran 3 minutes down the boardwalk and then came back to Grand.

No eruption so another 18 minutes of waiting.

I hustled the mile back to the cabin to get everyone out of bed. At 8000' elevation, hustling isnt all that fast! The time between eruption windows is about 18 minutes and I knew we couldn't get there for the very next window but the window 36 minutes out was doable. I wasn't wearing much so the family headed out while I got some warmer clothes on.
7 AM

Walking 40:00 [1] 2.0 mi (20:00 / mi)
slept:7.0 shoes: Inov8 RL 320 Blue

Walk back out to Grand Geyser.

Sure enough, Grand erupted at the 36 minute window. The family was there, but I missed the first couple minutes..... B was really excited and decided that we should spend the day waiting for the bigger geyser to erupt....

As we were about to go back to the cabin another spotter reported that another big geyser was due to erupt soon so we went with him to watch. Just as we got there, a report from another spotter came in that Grand Fountain Geyser (another 14 hour cycle geyers) was indicating an eruption in the next 45 minutes. We'd missed this one by minutes yesterday so off we went at a trot back to the cabin.

We piled into the car and drove the 8 miles to GF. Of course we got behind some knucklehead driving 15mph for a good chunk of the way. We got lucky though. We got parked and got a good seat and BOOM, off goes the geyser. This one erupts in a series of 4 or 5 bursts, each lasting 5-10 minutes with a period of quiet in between. We watched 4 bursts and then left.

Check another major geyser off Benjamins list.
12 PM

Walking (hike) 3:25:00 [2] 9.0 mi (22:47 / mi)
shoes: Montrail Boots

Dropped Mom, L, and B off at Old Faithful Geyser Basin trail head so they could walk the 2.5 miles back to the cabin and hopefully check off another couple of geysers on B's list.

William and I headed off to the Fairy Falls Trailhead for what we initially planned as a 5 mile hike up to the tallest waterfall in the park.


Fairy Falls was quite beautiful but the trail wasn't especially inspiring; An old maintenance road that had been covered with sand. Thru the '88 burn area, so no trees taller than 10 feet made the walking very warm.

Detoured up a steep hill to get a panoramic view of Prismatic Hot Spring in the Black Sands Geyser Basin. Well worth the effort. Prismatic is, I think, the largest hot spring in the world - or something like that.

Anyway, once we got to the falls we decided not to return via the same route.

Another .6 mile detour took us to a very cool back country geyser called Imperial. A large crystal blue spring with a continuously erupting geyser in the middle. Not super-huge but still impressive.

Our return loop took us on a 3 mile trek winding through a rather desolate but pretty meadow liberally sprinkled with steam vents, mud pots, and springs.
4 PM

Walking 40:00 [1] 2.0 mi (20:00 / mi)
shoes: Teva

Guess what! William and I got back from our hike to find out that Grand Geyser was closing in on another eruption.

Mom, B, and L were already at the Geyser. If we hurried, we might just make it in time.

Off we go.

Had to wait 2 - 18 minute windows and then the geyser erupted. And it was a good one. Much bigger than the morning edition. Grand usually erupts for about 10-20 minutes and then settles down for another 10+ hour slumber. This time however, as the eruption seemed to be winding down, the spotter yelled out "Don't LEAVE!, Get your cameras ready!" Sure enough. About 15 seconds later the geyser erupted in a huge explosion of water and steam lasting about another 5 minutes. Very cool!

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