Training Log Archive: blairtrewinIn the 1 days ending Nov 26, 2014:
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Wednesday Nov 26, 2014 #
Note
Not sure exactly what this is referring to (Hoggster, whom I presume is at the meeting it was sent from, may be able to enlighten us), but it's good to know I'm being missed :-)
8 AM
Run 1:00:00 [3] 11.0 km (5:27 / km)
Headed north from town in pursuit of a waterfall, initially on the gravel road (which I plan to spend more time on tomorrow), then on a (fairly flat) foot track for the last 1.5k or so. The waterfall having been duly sighted (and photographed), I then had the choice (given my intended distance) of continuing north for another 10 minutes, or going back and doing the extra in town. I did the town option, mainly in the name of checking out the conditions on the peaks (Fitz Roy is visible from the southern part of town but not the northern). Rather sleepy in the earlier stages, and Achilles wasn't having a great day either.
There was quite a lot of cloud around the village and I was wondering if it was going to be worth doing serious walking, but closer inspection revealed that the cloud was fairly high and that Fitz Roy, at least, was generally visible. I headed in that direction but didn't do quite what I'd originally planned - the last part of that walk is a fairly rugged climb (400m in 2k on scree) to a glacial lake, and the weather was good enough that I thought I might have a decent chance of seeing Cerro Torre if I went somewhere from which it was visible, whereas the climb was likely to give me a closer-up view of what I could already see quite spectacularly. I therefore decided to scrub the climb and instead do a 6km track which cut across to yesterday's route about halfway along.
The stated objective was achieved - I got a Cerro Torre summit sighting (well-timed; it was in cloud again within 20 minutes). What I hadn't anticipated was that the route to get there took me through some of the best orienteering terrain I'll never run on. The top couple of kilometres of the valley looked magical - open southern beech forest with very little understorey (though a bit of fallen timber), a reasonable number of clean rock features but not much rocky ground surrounding them - a bit like the nicer Australian granite areas - and not particularly steep as long as you didn't go too far up the mountain. The next ridge across looked even better from a distance, although I'm not sure if there was a good way across the dark green marsh in between to get there. (Note for those readers who aren't orienteers, and I know there are a few: dark green is the colour used on maps to show impenetrable or near-impenetrable vegetation: in Victoria it's usually blackberry or gorse). It will never be used on at least three counts ((a) it's in a national park where even off-track walking is technically forbidden (b) the closest vehicle access is about 7km away and (c) there are currently no orienteers based within 3000km of the place), but it was still fun to imagine events there during the half-hour or so that it took me to walk through it.
Today's walk ended up being about 20km as well; knew I'd had a decent day out by the end of it. A post-trek waffle and hot chocolate definitely hit the spot.
There was quite a lot of cloud around the village and I was wondering if it was going to be worth doing serious walking, but closer inspection revealed that the cloud was fairly high and that Fitz Roy, at least, was generally visible. I headed in that direction but didn't do quite what I'd originally planned - the last part of that walk is a fairly rugged climb (400m in 2k on scree) to a glacial lake, and the weather was good enough that I thought I might have a decent chance of seeing Cerro Torre if I went somewhere from which it was visible, whereas the climb was likely to give me a closer-up view of what I could already see quite spectacularly. I therefore decided to scrub the climb and instead do a 6km track which cut across to yesterday's route about halfway along.
The stated objective was achieved - I got a Cerro Torre summit sighting (well-timed; it was in cloud again within 20 minutes). What I hadn't anticipated was that the route to get there took me through some of the best orienteering terrain I'll never run on. The top couple of kilometres of the valley looked magical - open southern beech forest with very little understorey (though a bit of fallen timber), a reasonable number of clean rock features but not much rocky ground surrounding them - a bit like the nicer Australian granite areas - and not particularly steep as long as you didn't go too far up the mountain. The next ridge across looked even better from a distance, although I'm not sure if there was a good way across the dark green marsh in between to get there. (Note for those readers who aren't orienteers, and I know there are a few: dark green is the colour used on maps to show impenetrable or near-impenetrable vegetation: in Victoria it's usually blackberry or gorse). It will never be used on at least three counts ((a) it's in a national park where even off-track walking is technically forbidden (b) the closest vehicle access is about 7km away and (c) there are currently no orienteers based within 3000km of the place), but it was still fun to imagine events there during the half-hour or so that it took me to walk through it.
Today's walk ended up being about 20km as well; knew I'd had a decent day out by the end of it. A post-trek waffle and hot chocolate definitely hit the spot.