Training Log Archive: CleverSky

Loon, by myself. Nancy skipped work Friday morning to ski because she had to work Saturday, so I was on my own. Can't remember ever having gone downhill skiing alone before (except once when I was a kid and the neighbors I babysat for brought me but left me to ski on my own). I originally planned to go to Stratton, but the forecast there was to switch to rain, so I opted for a spot further north where it would remain as snow until at least late afternoon, and I believe I made the right choice. Hit the road early and arrived at the mountain just after 8 AM, and I lucked out and got the last parking spot in the main lot, which put me steps away from the ticket office and lift.

Nine runs before lunch, taking the opportunity to do the steep bump runs and glades that Nancy would not be interested in. My thighs felt tired and sore from the first run. Seemed like they didn't do much grooming, as there were even moguls on the blue trails. Very little waiting in lift lines as I was using the singles aisle. Light snow much of the day.

After some chili and hot chocolate, it was back to the slopes for as long as I could take it. Nine more runs, though this being Loon, two of the runs almost don't qualify because I count by lift rides, and the Tote Road lift is actually a horizontal transport to South Peak and back.

More of the same, plus one unintended adventure when I was heading down Boom Run and saw some tracks heading into the woods. There was a sign on a tree, and I couldn't read some of it, but one line said something like "enjoy some gentle downhill gliding". It appeared to be an old cart path that looked like it would probably connect back to Jobber, so I took it. For a while it did what I expected, but then it went uphill a bit, and the track stopped because the previous skiers had made a right and gone through the trees. Following suit looked like a bad move because that was Warren Miller territory and I was alone, so it would take a long time to find my body. Instead, I pressed forward, breaking trail through a foot of powder, with my poles not bottoming out. Took about 12 minutes to slog through that and get back out to a ski trail, but it will be easier going for the next dunce to follow my tracks.

It got pretty warm, up close to freezing (in the parking lot, anyway), but North Peak was in cloud. After one last woods run, I decided I'd had enough and the next run would be my last. Back to the car and on the road by 2:30 before any rain hit.

60 situps.

Snow dealings, round 6b: my driveway. Having given it enough chance to freeze up, as I arrived at home I had forgotten that I hadn't done my own driveway yet. So I parked by the mailbox and got out the snowblower which I ran up and down the driveway, but it had little effect on the boilerplate white stuff. The plow snow down by the road wasn't as bad as I feared, and I was able to handle it with a shovel, though much of that consisted of picking up big frozen chunks and tossing them aside.

60 situps, 25 pushups.

Bare Hill Pond, on my way to work. I decided to get up and make this happen, but then on my drive I noticed that the dusting of snow that fell yesterday and immediately melted actually stuck around where it fell on ice -- the lakes were all white. I headed down to the tiny token public access point in Harvard anyway, and it turned out (as I had hoped) that the snow was thin enough to be manageable. The ice was inconsistent, pretty bumpy in the NE near the beach, but not bad down in the south. They lower the water level in this lake a lot; the loop I was doing in the SW was as far as I could go, the rest of what looks like water in the aerial photo was actually frozen marsh. Not a very long outing, but at least I did it.

Snow dealings, round 6a: Nancy's driveway. Snow during the day transitioned to sleet/freezing rain/rain in the afternoon, and it was pretty wet and slushy when I got to her house in the evening, but the electric snowblower handled it fine. Leaving bare asphalt for the overnioght freezing rain to land on, leaving a nice thick shiny glaze by morning. So I sanded it.

60 situps. I had aspirations of doing some skating at night, but when my evening trip to CT got extended by an accident-induced traffic jam that had me stuck on the Mass Pike onramp for something like 45 minutes, a lot of my enthusiasm evaporated.

60 situps. Somewhat sore all over, but right arm particularly so, not sure if it's from double-poling or falling on it.

Pico, with Nancy, had only been there once before, back in college. Warmer, but windy. Eight runs, including the first one where I did an almost complete yard sale (hung onto one pole) in a place where there was no real excuse for falling.

And after lunch, six more runs. It had been snowing some since early on, but by afternoon it was snowing pretty hard, so we were in several inches of fresh powder. I did a couple of forays through the woods, which was fun in those conditions. No lift lines all day, presumably due to people getting ready to watch football. Hit the road in a snowstorm, which the Subaru with snow tires handled just fine, and made it back to Nancy's house about an hour after the Super Bowl kickoff, partway through the second quarter.