works of wanderlust

Category: running & adventure

My sport involves feet and trails and moving one quickly across the other.

  • Camping My Style

    December 5 of 31 December-ish posts

    I’m no stranger to crazy sleeping conditions when away from home. I’ve travelled far and wide and slept in a thousand different beds, from plush king-size mattresses to wooden bunks in unheated cabins to sleeping bags on the ground with a snow-covered tent just inches from my face.

    But somehow 2022 was something of a hotel year.

    What do you wish you’d done
    less of this past year?

    Multiple trips to the mountains and at least a few weeks abroad in 2022 and, if I’m being completely honest, I only spent a single night in a tent.

    I mean, sure, they frown on you pitching your own accommodations on the lawns around Disney World, and while I probably could have gotten away with it in New York’s Central Park, I was travelling light and a sleeping bag would have cluttered my carry on.

    I joke, but seriously though, I get to the end of 2022 looking back on my travels and outdoor adventures and by random happenstance they all kind of started and ended in reasonably nice hotels. 

    We stayed in a pirate themed room in Florida.

    My various trips to the mountains included a ski lodge condo, an Airbnb basement suite, renting an entire house with my running friends, and an apartment suite near to the highland games grounds where my daughter was competing that particular weekend.

    We booked an anniversary getaway to a nordic spa and I wasn’t going to convince my wife that tenting was a great accompaniment to that adventure.

    And in New York last month we were on the 33rd floor of a mid-town hotel overlooking the Hudson river with glimpses of Times Square.

    Hotels abounded.

    And while we were spoiled for every last one of those trips, I’ve been looking back over two-aught-twenty-two and kinda wish I’d had a few less of those kinds of adventures, and few more in one of our tents.

    We have three tents.

    Our oldest by far is an early-2000s model backpacking tent. It’s reasonably light, sleeps two, and served us well on numerous hiking trips.

    The big tent is our car camping tent, a hefty six person beast that has a full vestibule (into which I could fit either of my other two tents assembled) and it’s what we bought so we could camp as a family with a dog in her kennel everyone on an inflatable bed and yet still keep all the luggage organised.

    The newest tent is the three person ultra-compact tent that we bought as a replacement for our first ageing backpacking tent. It’s so lightweight  it practically carries itself up the mountain, and we’ve set it up only four times in as many years, mostly thanks to those particular hiking trails being closed due to the pandemic.

    It’s a good thing I cleaned and packed them all so well in 2021 because they didn’t really see much action this year.

    Now, I don’t purport this blog to be a camping blog, per se, but there is a certain expectation from even just me that the term “outdoor adventure” comes with a certain frequency of sleeping outdoors. I subscribe to enough other content creators to know that some of those folks are sleeping outdoors on the weekly, and even the local guys I watch truck it out to the coast for the harshest part of winter to keep up their stats.

    I checked into hotels a lot this year. And I kinda dropped the ball on the tenting. And I’m actually a little bit sad about that.

  • Snakes, Ditches, Mud, and Ticks

    Each summer for the last few I’ve hosted a small adventure club for a group of my running friends. We call them Adventure Runs, though running occasionally turns out to be only a minor component of the adventure.

    So…. once again it is summer, and once again yesterday morning I posted our secret meetup location in our chat server, anticipated all day long, then finally after work ended for the day drove to the secluded parking spot and waited to see who else showed up.

    Adventure Journal

    It had rained all afternoon.

    Not just rained. It had poured, complete with thunder and lightning, clacks of huge rain droplets batting against the windows and sending coworkers on our video meetings running off camera to close windows and comfort pets.

    At 5pm we were texting back and forth about whether to delay our running plans.

    But by 6pm the sunshine was back and I was lacing up my trail shoes and trying to remember exactly how to navigate the city streets to where I’d agreed to meet up for a local adventure.

    The thing about trying to find interesting and unique places to run in the suburbs of a big city is that we really have just two choices for trails that are not of the well-maintained asphalt or crushed shale-surfaced accessible recreational locales: we either need to drop into the river valley or we need to find a bit of wilderness trapped between the cultivated corridors of roads, housing and shopping malls.

    A dozen years ago a major infrastructure project resulted in the city building a ring road encircling a major part of the established city-proper. The road itself is almost eighty kilometers long with access points into and out of town every three to five klicks, and while in most places it snakes by the clusters of houses with naught but a bit of grassy ditch to separate the two, there are huge swaths of road anchored inside what’s called a transportation utility corridor (TUC) where clearance has been maintained to build roads, power transmission lines, and oil pipelines.

    I was also acutely aware of a spot not too far (but not easily accessible) where a particularly interesting swath of TUC had been combined with some natural preserve, an old, blocked off access road, and an interesting destination at the end of the connected trail.

    Into the Woods

    On any given summer day, the trail that led from the quasi-parking lot to the east access of the locally famous “graffiti tunnel” would have been a moderately challenging bit of dirt-based single track weaving through and around eclectic landscapes crushed between a busy highway to the south and a winding high-watered creek to the north.

    An hour after our quadrant of the city had been doused in an afternoon summer storm, those same trails were glistening and muddy, the tall grasses were hung heavy with rainwater, and the protruding heaps of clay silts that marked the marshy landscape near to the creek were more slippery than had we been running on our familiar winter ice slicks.

    As we descended into this twisting, wet, and perilous collection of intersecting trails, each of the seven of us often veering off course to find a bit of path we were individually more comfortable with, a mix of caution and excitement bubbled through the group.

    At one point I stopped abruptly with two of my companions close on my heels, slamming on my brakes in the wet mud and barely avoiding stepping on a medium-sized garter snake soaking up the sun on the middle of the path. I shooed it away and “stood guard” as one of my ophidiophobic running mates inched by and squealed in fear.

    Familiar Destinations

    More tall grass (hiding nasty ticks!)

    A scramble hand-over-hand up a small, nearly impassible hill.

    A leap of faith over an ant hill the size of a small car.

    And wet feet all around, even though we never did get very close to the creek at all.

    While the west side of the graffiti tunnel is accessible from a gentle gravel path connected to some of our local neighbourhood running routes, the east side (separated by a muddy creek) is only found on foot by following the two-and-a-half klick route through the trees and grass and wilderness-laden ditch through which we had just run.

    We ogled the years of overlapping graffiti that covered the old pedestrian underpass (yet to be connected to the trail system-proper even eighteen years after it’s installation), took a bunch of photos and selfies, and then contemplated our alternate routes back to the cars… ultimately deciding to face the known perils of retracing our steps back rather than trying to find a simpler (but far longer) route home.

    It is almost a rite of passage for a guy who plans crazy running routes to listen to the grumbles and complaints, cursing and swearing of those silly enough to follow him into the wilderness.

    And it is certainly rewarding to lead all of those people full circle to their cars and to realize that every single one of them just experienced something they’ll remember for long after we’ve all gone home and washed the mud from our ankles.

  • Race Report: Blackfoot

    Sunday Runday, and I’m moving gingerly around the house this morning in recovery mode after a long, tough race yesterday.

    After a two and a half year wait, and two covid-postponments, the Blackfoot Ultra finally crossed the start line on Saturday. A good proportion of the racers never showed up, obviously fallen out of training or enthusiasm after signing up for a race in 2019, but those who did — including myself — spent hours in the rolling parkland, baking under the spring sun, and plodding out our distances towards the finish line.

    I had signed up for the 25km edition, the ”Baby Ultra”, and just a bit more than a half marathon. Road race distances are a meaningless comparison to trail running distances though. One kilometer in the woods can feel like a nature walk …or mountain climb. The mental focus of watching the terrain and adjusting to the trail is incomparable to running on asphalt in the city, and times can vary wildly based on a thousand factors that don’t even exist in an suburban run.

    The woman who I had been training with for the last few months (specifically for this race) and the last two and a half years (in general) was one of those who did not reach the start line. Even as we were debating carpool options and pickup times and collecting our race packages, she stuffed a covid swab up her nose after some worrisome symptoms and withdrew due to a positive test less than twenty-four hours before the gun. A huge disappointment for her after such a long wait for just this one race.

    I didn’t have any excuse.

    And this would mark the third time I’ve run this race. I knew what I was in for… generally.

    I ate my breakfast, and filled my water bottles and packed my trail running gear into my little black truck. I loaded up a group shelter tent to set up at the finish line and tossed a lawn chair in the back, and then drove for about an hour through and east of the city to a bit of medium-sized provincial parkland wrapped around a cluster of lakes and rolling landscape all traced through with trails and winding paths.

    In the winter this is a popular cross-country skiing area, and the wide paths are groomed by a tractor-sized ski-track groomer that sets paths in the road-width nature path.

    In the summer, the province mows and maintains the trail for cyclists, and hikers and runners, but it is still a rutted, rooted, muddy mess in places.

    The longer editions of the race, those running multiple laps to clock in 50km, 80km or even 100km, had started in some cases before I’d even gotten out of bed and had been running for as much as six hours when I stepped to the start line. Even in our little running crew, about half of our contingent were doing the 50km double lap race, while a few of us tackled the more conservative 25km baby.

    Even so, by 11am when our start time finally kicked in, the day still felt young though the sun was high and the skies were blue and the multiple cups of coffee I’d consumed leading into it all had well-and-good kicked in.

    With an unceremonious countdown from five, a couple hundred of us were off into the woods for our crack at the trails.

    I could detail thousands of bits that still cling to my memory now the next morning. The mud. The sunscreen sweating into my eyes. My running companion chatting away to me and the trees and everyone who we saw. Leaping over roots. Hearing rumours (and later genuine reports) of a bear on the trail. That tree that seemed ready to topple in the breeze, cracking and groaning as we dodged by. The glorious taste of fresh cut watermelon at the aid station. Taking off my shoe 14km in to bandage a small, fresh blister. Swatting away swarms of bugs. Or the hundreds of little micro conversations that were had as we passed or were passed by others.

    It was a slog. A glorious, painful slog filled with three hours of unique experiences.

    Yet, to be clear, I haven’t run more than a half marathon distance of 21km since well before the pandemic started. Twenty five kilometers, and trail kilometers at that, were tough. There are many mighty fit folks, lots of whom passed me as I forced my body up yet another hill, who cranked through multiple times more distance than I did and still looked fresh as the morning dew. I struggled, admittedly. I walked long bits of it willing my legs to achieve a speed faster than a brisk woodland stroll, particularly near the end stretch as the aches and pains and mental fog began to hurt everything about the experience.

    Then we rounded a corner and there was the finish chute, a pathway between the tents and lawnchairs of the spectators and crews leading into the flag marking the finish line, everyone cheering and clapping and one couldn’t help but push just a little bit harder and finish the race strong.

    And suddenly, after two and a half years, the whole thing was just done. I collapsed into my lawnchair and recovered my wits and my breath. Twenty-five kilometers of trail behind me, and for the first time in a very long time, not a single race on my calendar. As I sipped my water, and ate the bison smokie dog they handed me at the finish line, and waited for the other runners in our crew to finish, we chatted and relaxed.

    I don’t know what is next, but I think I’ll rest my legs a few more days before I try and figure that out.

  • Little Lives

    Sunday Runday, and my morning run (though short) was a fast, local race.

    Too often I discount and downplay the value of lacing up for a cause that isn’t just another tick on the tally of my own personal achievements. Yet a five kilometer fundraiser race, as far removed as it is from the epic half marathons and ultra trail races that seem to consume my training calendar these days, is a heartwarming reminder of my sports more enduring legacy in the modern running landscape.

    Some backstory may be relevant here.

    I often write and talk about my ”little run club” but the truth is that prior to the pandemic we were a crew that was often forty or fifty members strong. The last two years have whittled us down to less than half that number, and only time will tell if some of the folks who drifted away will return. Two years is a long time.

    Between those who remain and those who have gone away, some of have been running together for well over a decade. Also, needless to say, some of our membership are not the young thirty, forty and fifty year olds that we were when we met and started running all those years ago. As years have ticked by many of our crew have transitioned from a running crew to a walking club, still keeping themselves woven in as part of the social fabric of this club. No matter, though, we all meet back at the same parking lot for chats and coffees. A decade or more and people have had rich lives swirled around this little sport, changing jobs, growing their family, moving too and fro, and even passing on.

    Fair to report that not everything is good news when years pass and people change and stuff happens.

    The story, as best as I know it, goes something like this. About four years ago, one of those aforementioned runners-turned walkers-became a grandmother, and as happy as that occasion should have been, it was shrouded with bad news about a huge complication: that her new grandson had a congenital heart defect and would require a transplant.

    Daughter-slash-mother, a runner like grandmother, turned her grief into motivation and started an annual fundraising race. “Fundraiser for free-health-care Canada?” you ask. Well, there are plenty of costs outside of hospital bills that families need to account for, and our health care system has limited funds to contribute to things like research and family supports and outreach.

    Those efforts, as announced as we stood at the start line for this morning’s edition of the 5k family fun race, runners bunched in around kids on bikes and tots holding their parents hands, has raised a quarter million dollars for the cause since its inception.

    Now my friend’s grandson has spent a lot of time in hospital and will likely never be a kid free to adventure and play without restraint, and certainly may never be seen sprinting to the finish line at the lead of the race that he inspired. Instead, we all put our personal training plans aside and dash through the course for whatever bit of hope for a cure and support for that family that such an effort inspires.

    Rich lives and a decade of running with the same small group tangles your lives together in a way that leads you to prioritize your actions and your thoughts.

    I’ll be running a much longer race next weekend, a slogging ultramarathon through the rolling lakelands east of the city and for no other reason than to say I can do such things. But something tells me that even years from now I’ll remember little five klick runs for the good of little lives just as fondly as the big races.

  • The Mystery of Big Island (Part Three)

    It’s been nearly a year and a whole long winter of impassable trails through the river valley since I posted an update about the work being done to turn a small bit of land with a big local history into a small provincial park.

    The last time we thought about that effort on this site, a small group of us had gone off on a short adventure run to test our prospects of finding a runnable trail between my house and the bit of natural space clinging to the edge of the river.

    What we found instead was a dead end. And a furthering of the mystery behind this bit of future park where it seemed our odds of future adventure were good, if not simple to find.

    You can read about the first two parts of that adventure here on this blog in The Mystery of Big Island Part One and Part Two.

    The mystery seemed as if it would continue to allude us with no more media coverage and limited ability to drop into a snow-filled river valley for our own fact-finding-fun prior to May. My aim was to start up my investigations once again this summer with some alternative entry options and perhaps drag along a friend or five to continue our search for elusive access to Big Island.

    And then I was meandering through Twitter this morning only to discover this (politically charged) tweet of how one of our local, bumbling politicians had accidently (really?) posted a confidential planning map with some clear intentions for the ongoing work around Big Island.

    https://twitter.com/SeanDunn10/status/1526506339882569728

    (Screenshot of the tweet archived here.)

    The little grey blot in the middle of the sea of appropriately-coloured blue land marks the Big Island proper with some surrounding farmlands clearly marked for possible buyout or annexation or something relating to creating a protected public zone around this little natural treasure.

    I’ve been studying maps of this exact area, trying to understand if there is a good place to park and find access into the valley .

    Clearly if I have a government sticker on my truck (which I do not) parking near to and descending upon this bit of land wouldn’t be a problem. Looking at the tweeted photos it’s clear that if a politician can clamber down into the area in his work clothes, a handful of runners with trail gear must be able to find a way too.

    Of course, this accidental leak implies that multiple people are thinking much bigger than I am about this little future park. I’m working on a video about a different river valley park and some time I spent there recently, but seeing this information has made me even more determined to bring some friends and a camera back on another summer adventure, an adventure to uncover the mystery of Big Island… preferably before they plow a road there and everyone figures it out.

    Stay tuned for Part Four…