Training Log Archive: PG

Here's the map for the weekend's rogaine -- larger version, and a smaller version to see the big picture easier.

The map was a mix of quality, as for some of the area there are regular O maps, and for some not. So some places there were all sorts of small details, other places not, and in some places the contour lines were a lot more accurate. Everywhere the mapping of vegetation indicated only what was coniferous (green) or deciduous (white), with no information given about the thickness of the forest except for one logged area marked west of 66.

Took some flexible thinking, which I seemed mostly to be lacking....

Comments on a few legs --



#22 -- Western rock pile. Rock piles on a rogaine map? Attacked from the trail junction, very nice angled approach, bit of compass, bit of pace, bit of map reading, forget looking for rockpiles, I was just looking for the flag, and nothing to be seen. Walked right past a rockpile, oblivious to it until Barb pointed it out. No flag. Located its neighbor, no flag there either. Map was actually excellent, rock piles and contour fit perfectly. Decided quickly to move on, Barb took a photo of the nice large maple the flag should have been hung on, and we headed off. And then found the flag by chance by a couple of stray stones up near the main trail....

#63 -- looked simple, road then trail right to the point. Except the semi-open area where the "trail" started was head-high grass, no sign of a trail. Picked up a trail for a while on the hillside, but it soon faded away. Found the point OK reading the contours but one of many times I found myself wondering whether trails (or boundary lines and the yellow spots of paint on the trees marking them) were really going to be there.



Our overall route was probably not the smartest. When we got the maps, I sort of spaced out while Barb sketched out a route connecting all the points. "What have you come up with?" she asked me. "Nothing really. What have you got?" After a momentary glance, "Looks good." And after another moment, "Which direction are we going?" And one or the other suggesting going NW first, and that was that. No consideration given to where we might be at night, for example....

And so as we were spending a good bit of time Saturday afternoon in the NE part of the map, which would have been the perfect place to visit during the night, I looked ahead, and I remember thinking, We are going to have some tough night controls.

It got dark on the way to 67, got light on the way to 19.

#34 -- Conifer tree, looked to be in the middle of a narrow clearing. The idea of looking for a single pine tree in a mostly conifer forest in the middle of the night seemed a bit daunting. Didn't know if the trail north of it existed or not, it turned out to be wide enough to drive on. A careful approach through a thick stand of conifers dropped us into a little clearing, and there was a pine tree and a flag. Cool.

#54 -- More dense conifers to weave through on the way, looking for a vegetation boundary. Nailed it.

#37 -- Talk about a control that seemed impossible, a little copse of conifers on a bland hillside, again in a mostly conifer forest. Down the ridge a ways, looking to take the second trail to the left and use the end of it as an attack point. Could find that trail, so just dropped down the hillside and then headed south, perfect example of winging it. I figured the odds of finding it were about 10%. Went for a while, no sign of a reflector. Felt like we'd gone a little too far, the slope felt a little different, hooked around, dropped down a little and back 100 meters and there it was. Really cool.

#29 -- Aimed off upstream, no problem other than very junky woods.

#74 -- Boundary corner. Just east of 29 was the scene of our hand-to-hand combat (see Saturday's log entry), just totally miserable for over half an hour. Finally got out, debated bagging 74, no idea how bad the woods might be the rest of the way. But the woods south of the stream were fine, so we pushed on. No idea of course where we had started, but reasonably sure we were along the correct stream. Up, and up some more, and just about ready to give up, and then a "No Tresspassing" sign appears, bingo.



#57 -- Spur near boundary. Looked straightforward. Except no sign of a fork in the trail, and what we were following was definitely going north. Cut back heading SW, figured we'd catch one of a couple of trails, no sign of anything other than prickers until, hey, there's yellow paint on that tree, yup, a boundary, back to the east a little and there was the flag.

#71 -- Leaving 57, stupid me, just because I hadn't seen a trail just north of 57 on the way in, that didn't mean I wasn't expecting to see it on the way out. Heading north quite a while, no trail, then suddenly here's a trail going east/west, I still have no idea where it was going, so it was time again to wing it. Didn't know where we were, but it seemed sensible to head north along the slope for about 300 meters, more or less, and then angle down the slope and see what we found. Which we did, and after quite a long time and we hadn't seen anything and I'm thinking this time we're going to get burned, Barb, off to my right, calls out, "I think I see some sort of reflecting thingy." And I think, great, probably a junk car or a marker for a snowmobile trail. It took a couple more calls before I realized that she had in fact spiked the control. Awesome.

The rest of our adventure was, well, the word for the weekend was "relaxed." Barb ran once, I believe, when she spotter Balter and Speedy coming the other way, me not at all. We finished about 40 minutes early because it seemed unnecessary to go get another one. A fine rogaine indeed, once again an excellent partner.

And the lack of blisters was a great surprise, even though the bottoms of my feet are not too happy. But that will pass.

The absolute worst jungle I have even been in during an O' event, easily surpassing such favorites as the lush field of head-high prickers at the Sons of Norway meet, any mountain laurel anywhere (even at the Ratlum estate), and the three-story acres of deadfall at a rogaine in Washington state.

This area seemed to be a combination of two- and three-story blowdowns and logging slash with lush pricker growth, with the added benefit that we were there at night. Couldn't see enough to realize how big the area was, couldn't see enough to figure out the best way out. A lot of cussing. And a very strong desire to just sit down and cry.

Figured out after the fact that in the 35 minutes we spent there we had covered about 400 meters.

Other than that, the CNYO rogaine was just fine.

C • Worst vegetation anywhere 7

Event: CENTRAL NEW YORK ROGAINE XVIII
 

CNYO rogaine with Barb.

Remarkable on several fronts --

No blisters. Bought new shoes on Wednesday, broke them in during a round of rogaine practice of Thursday, and they turned out great.

Further refinement of the sophisticated O' technique called "winging it." "Winging it" is a combination of precision map reading, precision compass, precision pace counting, all done at night, and -- here's the key point -- when the starting position is unknown. Several successful uses of this skill, possibly helped by a dash of good luck.

A very pleasant 15-20 minutes spent lying on my back in the rain at about 3 am while Barb tended to her ailing digestive system. The essence of a rogaine where the key word was "relaxed."

Very excellent company once again, including her most truly excellent spiking of a night control that I had given up hope on. A lot of fun.

Massive overdosing of caffeine, given my very light intake over the last couple of years, including half a vintage caffeine pill (no idea what the dose was, but it was a big pill) during the "lying on my back" time out, when I was feeling just a little too relaxed, plus a full pill plus a couple of sodas for the drive home.

A split decision with the FDFs -- the usual shut-out in my favor on Saturday, but then the blue cap had to be de-blued when the headlamp came out, so Sunday I was out there naked, so to speak, and results were reminiscent of the old days before the blue caps. Not pretty.

A clear loss to a marauder of the night air, the sweet and harmless looking but incredibly irritating moth. Yup, plain old moths, though I believe they now deserve to be called MFMs. Must have had a score or two buzzing me for much of the night. Sounds quite benign, in actuality quite dreadful. Yeah, I know the easy fix, just turn off the headlamp....

I'll post a map tomorrow.

C • FDF 9

No training today other than a bit of last-minute rogaine practice just to sharpen my skills.

And then back to the urologist again, this time for a longer talk about options. The good news is that there are (relatively) good options, meaning in his opinion that the cancer can be cured so that I will eventually croak from something else. :-)

So one option not recommended is to do nothing, which would make sense if I was older and/or in worse health. The basic choices are a couple of different kinds of radiation (external or seeds), or surgery, plus there are hormonal treatments, plus some folks would tell you if you just eat the right things or take the right supplements you will cure everything, plus of course you can just pray (but that probably wouldn't work in Massachusetts because we have gay marriage, at least that's what I assume Rev. Pat would say....).

So none of this is very appealing, though I have a feeling that I can deal with it, I think. The problem is, what do you choose. You can listen to what doctors say, you can read the research, you can see what other people's experiences have been, you can look at the odds, you can try to weigh things according to what you feel and think and want...

And you still don't/won't know if you made the right choice. Until it's too late to change.

So the next appointment will be with a radiation specialist to see what he says. Today's appointment was with a surgeon, but he wasn't pushing surgery, he was just optimistic that I had several options, any of which would cure things. And I should remember to be glad that I seem to have several (relatively) good options rather than no good options at all.

C • All we get are educated gue... 4

Having more trouble than ever getting things done, it seems. Such as the list of e-mails that need to be answered....

On the other hand, did manage to get plane reservation to go to Laramie, though only figure on being in Laramie for maybe Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Will spend a few days beforehand somewhere in the mountains, haven't figured that out yet.

No more training before this weekend's rogaine....

Tuesday evening Mt. Toby group, had my doubts about the wisdom of going given the heat, humidity, and bad air, but did, and made it around, though (perhaps wisely) the pace was on the slow side and the legs were feeling a bit tenderized by the end. Carried and drank one bottle of Gatorade, still lost 5 and a half pounds.

Ran the whole climb up South Mt. road, but walked a little more than usual up the steep section by the S curves. There was no choice.

Will take it easy now until the rogaine this weekend, and hope to take that at a relatively relaxed pace too, as it is supposed to be in the 90s.

C • 5.5 lbs 5