Running along the dry, rocky trail strewn with pine needles in the Anacortes Forest Lands, I never expected to see a murder in progress. The perpetrator, Thamnophis sirtalis, lay dead across the trail, its prey having progressed nearly halfway along its digestive tract before it came to an…ahem…dead stop. I grabbed the nearest stick and carefully …
Tag Archives: trail running
Bad News, Free Shoes, Spectacular Views
Standing alone in our tiny, two-room, bathroomless cabin in Winthrop on race morning, I took a step, felt a twinge atop my thigh, and collapsed, which didn’t seem like a great start to my Cutthroat Classic 2017 adventure. Even worse: it happened twice more before I’d even made my way to the start line. Less …
Ragnar Trail Rainier: It Ain’t For Babies
“It’s Ragnar Trail for babies,” I told my teammates a month from the start of the race. I’d seen the trail map screen and neglected to notice that the 800′ of climb shown was for the Green Loop only. A week later, while scrutinizing the site, I realized my mistake. Total climb: 4,500 feet, which …
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Race Report: 2017 Chuckanut Mountain Half Marathon
A Washington Department of Natural Resources publication includes the article Paleogeography and Paleontology of the Early Tertiary Chuckanut Formation, Northwest Washington, “Residents of northwest Washington feel at home in a landscape where majestic forests provide a foreground for rugged mountain vistas-except on the many days when the panorama is obscured by fog and drizzle. Fossils in the Chuckanut …
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Race Report: Mt Erie Trail Run
Putting The Art of Racing in the Rain into practice wouldn’t have been necessary during this year’s Dallas Kloke Mt Erie Road and Trail Run. Meteorologists forecasted cloudy skies with no chance of precipitation. Had I known my new nemesis, younger and smaller than I, would embarrass me so much, I may have decided to just …
Race Report: Oregon Coast 30K
Lying flat on my back on the wet grass after the race, a guy behind me says, “That was hard as f&*#.” I smile and say to my sister, “What he said.” The previous afternoon, as JoDee and I previewed the final mile of the 30K/50K courses, she was tearful. My sister had injured her IT …
Race Report: Ragnar Trail Cascades
“Eat my dust,” said no runner EVER, but that’s what over 1,700 participants in the inaugural running of Ragnar Trail Cascades did (and I theirs), literally, while on the trails and in The Village at Loup Loup Ski Bowl this past weekend. Fifteen four-person ultra and 204 eight-person regular teams converged upon this little known …
Silver Falls Trail Half Marathon 2015
In August, my sister and I signed up for the November 8, 2015, Silver Falls Trail Half Marathon, my fourth and her first trail race. Registration for the super popular 1,000 participants race, in existence since 2010, typically fills up within an hour. We looked forward to the chance to run along the Trail of Ten …
Sage Hills Trails
During the safety briefing, I realized that my fire shelter had been breached. I had never been so scared. It was the summer of 1986, the year before I graduated from college, and I was one of a group of many Gifford Pinchot National Forest employees highly encouraged to volunteer to help fight forest fires …
Trail Running (or Hiking) at Dugualla State Park
Even those who have lived on Whidbey Island for years might not know about Dugualla State Park, part of Deception Pass State Park. Of the seven sites listed on the Deception Pass Park Foundation web site, which include: Goose Rock, The Bridge, Cranberry Lake, West Beach, Rosario Beach and Tide Pools, Pass Lake, North Beach, Hoypus …
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