Training Log Archive: CleverSky

Hanley Mountain. I got skunked and landed after 10 minutes, while the other guys flew for 4 hours, so I went up on foot to get the truck. (There was small a motorcycle available, but I just wasn't motivated to try to teach myself how to operate such a thing). The distance is very approximate since I don't know where the trail goes up the mountain. gmap-pedometer said 3.7 miles (plotting a pretty straight route up), and then I deducted a half-mile for the part where Ducky gave me a ride from his farm to the bridge in the back of his pickup. Temperature was somewhere up in the 80s, so I wasn't doing much that qualifies as running once I left the road. About 43 minutes for the ascent.

Clarks Hill x 3. Seemed like this was a decent climb, and people have talked about how we need to install a defibrillator for anyone climbing the trail in the conservation land, so I figured it would be a good workout (I had never been into the woods here). I was running late, so instead of running there from home I parked at the Ritter Building and ran from there. Three trips up from the Page St. hydrant to the field at the top, which it appears is only 260 feet of climb. Climbs took 5:51, 6:19, 6:22. Also ran around a little on the trails at the top.

NE Canoe-O Champs, Crow Island Assabet River, championship course, in Aims's J200. Probably the slowest boat to do the longest one, but also (I think) the only C-1, so I got to take home a shirt. I think this is the only time I've had a paddle in my hands since the canoe-O last summer, and that was the only time since Pawtuckaway the previous year (or has it maybe been even longer?). I haven't completely forgotten everything, so I'm still a mediocre paddler (as opposed to a horrible one). No real problems with boat handling, which was nice (no wind due to the sheltered river venue). The one error was a control on a pond away from the river (across a dirt road), where I initially went to the right, then spotted the control across the water and had to go the other way around, less than a minute lost, I think. Portaged on the first control instead of paddling down the little pond, and also portaged the long upstream leg to #6 -- probably 1500 meters or so of carrying the boat on my shoulders on that one. A competent showing, but nothing to get excited about. The 110 m of climb was real, as there was one control on top of a big hill. I was at a real disadvantage on that one, as the C2s could keep the boat moving while one person went up the hill.

Picking up some controls afterwards. Interesting AOWN/discovery moment at the last one, which was at a landing spot. As I got out of the boat, a snake that was curled up on the bank decided to hightail it out of there, but its normal escape route is into the water, so it suddenly leaped directly toward me and disappeared into the river in the vicinity of my ankles. Pretty cool!