Training Log Archive: bl

Exeter TF, high 40s. North part. My start triangle was on a 21 year old map from Nov. '97 meet and, not surprising, but to my considerable amusement, the end of road parking circle had morphed into the continuation of the road and many more houses. Very nice woods for the most part, being hardwood, so it was bright today with generally long views of the contours. Went straight for the most part. Got confused crossing the power line on the way to #8, misreading the swamps for no excusable reason. One hard fall crossing an easy beaver damn fooled by ice over leaves which then became ice.

Map

An impressively dreary day. The Y was "no contest".

Inside the motel before breakfast. Hadn't been in a pool in quite a few years.
Grandkids showed up, too and additionally wanted treadmill "instructions".

Home via St. Albans, Montgomery Center etc. We had lunch with Bob at a cafe-bike shop in the center. A most colorful place, both the town and this particular shop. Home via northern Vermont's very scenic roads, through the Notch & down 93.

In Burlington by the lake behind the hockey rink building. A calm, bright day. 2-3" snow, so a seasonal Christmas Day. Yesterday's drive was most wintry at the high point of 89. So bare in the Concord area and 100% white here.

Group photo at the end of Christmas Day.

Stoneybrook again around noon. 50 on/50 off for most part & generally OOB.

Bear Brook O/woods fix. Sunny, T mid-30s but shade makes it colder. Had 2 maps to cover various possibilities. Both gates were closed tho roads were completely free from snow & ice. Headed toward camping, entered the woods a bit beyond the archery pond and made an incorrect assumption from the get go - a water-filled depression that was not the one I assumed it was. I could see pretty quickly that contours didn't match or make sense and then the key boulder I expected to see had taken a trip, too. Continued straight W to the water features - swamp & stream some 200-250m away. Did not bother to figure out where I was along the way - too vague & thick. Finally came to the mapped stream and finally noticed it was at a/the junction. It wasn't readily apparent. But I convinced myself of what was true and life began to make sense. Found my second bonafide feature, a boulder, then a small but mapped RS. Then headed more W, across a swamp and arrived in white woods and big contours which was most pleasant. Ups & downs, and long views and most felt new. Then back down from the heights, across a familiar swamp from the 2 A meets some years ago. A few familiar knolls and the last big hill, about the time the phone/Strava died. Have no idea why the first mile didn't get logged.

Map.

14 vehicles incl mine in parking.

Stoneybrook around 5p. No traffic makes this a local/simple out-the-door solution to after-dark training. Some 50/50, good to get OOB. The full moon night but overcast.

Moonlight walk in Nottingcook. Had a headlamp but the experience was better without except in thick pine and hemlock when I chose to cut back through the woods (where the lighting up of scratchy branches was very useful) vs staying on the road. Interesting how thoroughly the bright light drowns out moonlight. I eventually needed the moon to get out to where I was expecting to get - contours and any familiarity (not much given vegetation growth) with the area weren't of any use. Finally, I resorted keeping the moon directly at my back and/or following its shadows. A set of hunter tracks weaved in and out of my route.

I took Mocha and Coco ('96) along. Wouldn't have thought to do so but Beth said "every time I go to the woods, I talk to Mocha and Zoe". Zoe ('15) and (Molly '00) came along in spirit.

Winter solstice Friday, full moon Saturday.

Beat today from a poor night's sleep. Napped in the car in front of Best Buy after work before going inside.

Sore back & stiff from yesterday & before. Passed up a swim at the Y which would have been a first to go for a Sunday ride with Beth. We went direct to Mt Vernon, then New Boston & home from there. NH is a nice little state.

One sighting. We had a turkey pecking at our window this morning as in "get downstairs and feed us".

Beaver Brook, UNO green from 12/1. Went back today, temp was 50F, mostly cloudy and parking was completely empty. 2 weeks ago at the very same time, there were almost no spaces when I got there just before noon. Christmas impact today no doubt but what a day for a walk etc. Three people came just before I left. And still only that car 2 hours later.

The green course had 4 different first points - the rest were identical to brown. Couldn't be too careful going to 2, 5,6,7, 8. I'd already been to most of the hardest. Still had trouble with brown 4-green 8. It's probably OK mapped but the visibility is so low and contours so hidden by fir, it makes so much for a bingo point. I found it this time on a lone, nearby boulder, walking slowly, deliberately. The final point on the west side for both courses has some ups & downs not well mapped and the ride(s) seem(s) off too but I didn't stop to really figure out what exactly was going on. Chose different routes where it made sense. No snow on the ground. I'm impressed this was done in 60' by an unfamiliar name. There was a time when <10'/k was a given for me. This particular terrain challenges 'best laid plans'.

Map

Can't get the 310 to show splits on the gpx file try as I may.

Mostly back on 122 and 13, again thru Mt. Vernon, New Boston, Goffstown & Dunbarton...lots of NH charm.

Green - Splits

After work, had no energy.

Local loop on a still, gray December afternoon. Good to get outside. Day started cold but it was fine by mid-afternoon. December bleakness strikes a minor chord. Mocha & I used to go to the SB bog regularly. Haven't been by in months. Always a contemplative moment to be had there, even when green.

Y after work. Have a good (bad?) case of lumbago - bothering me for past 4-5 days. Hard to stand up straight most of the time. Don't know where it came from.

At Bear Brook. Had two maps that assumed I'd get into the park (one course began near Bear Hill Pond) but the road above Podunk lot was mostly ice. Probably negotiable but I couldn't bring myself to really try, after a half-hearted start. So no map and turned it into a good walk. When I eventually hit a path, I decided I liked paths today. Made my way to Hayes Field and around the field loop and back.

Met a young couple from Boston area looking at the park map in Podunk parking. They had never been to BB, wondered if there was another entrance. I was able to point out some fun possibilities but harder today for first time visitors who were not really dressed for it.

Went to the Y after work, in part with the expectation of changing for a run outside on a blue dome 30F pm but didn't find running pants amongst my warmth riches. Backtracked to being indoor & did 3 x 20' on the treadmill with virtual screen choices of Pacific NW rainforest to alpine vantage, Auckland Domain & Beagle Channel walk-jog for distraction and/or inspiration.

An evening visit with Per Stensby (and his son Per Olla) at Granite Ledges in Concord. I visited Per in June. Today’s occasion was in part to pick up 72 WOC ’93 mugs that Per had for a quarter century at various homes, the last being New London. And Sara Mae Berman had asked that they be made available for fund raising. I am a go between. Per’s son is back and forth between NH and mid-coast Maine and we arranged this rendezvous. ONA had a timely WOC article that I took with me, along with a still-sealed WOC men’s classic course and a compass. Per’s memory has failed. I knew that in June. I wondered if these orienteering memorabilia might strike a chord.

Sitting in the lobby of the assisted living facility, about to enter the memory-loss unit, and looking at the WOC course and ONA article with Christmas music in the background was indeed a step into the past. Per, 87, was fairly good about some details. We had a nice visit & it was fun to meet his son, too.

A mug in hand (that hadn't seen the light of day for many years).

From B&B to Hynes auditorium. Pleasantly surprised to see it was light & not particularly cold. In fact, had to shed a layer by the first mile. An abundance of activity including quite a few runner-joggers, especially as I got to the river. Zigged & zagged in Somerville, then some straight toward the Pru, then the Mass Ave bridge on a blue dome, sunlit morning then some searching for Hynes, the phone being about dead. Satisfying start to a sedentary day.

From Hynes to Harvard Square. Just getting dark, lots of activity everywhere, people going home, by foot, or bike. Quite nice along the river. Memory lane in stages, even as far back as 1971. Met Beth & Doug at the Coop. The three of us had dinner nearby. Ate everything on the plate which must have been a tribute to calories burned. Took an Uber back to Somerville. Walk-jog is what I could do today.

Token "training" in Somerville at the end of a long day. A bit of wander from an Air B&B, incl a pizza stop for a bring-back dinner. A world apart from quasi-rural Bow - close-quartered houses, a macadam maze, holiday lights - nothing like the dark etc in Bow.The day began with an alarm that failed us. Fortunately Beth asked what time it was. Left 40+' late for the desired arrival time in Boston. The drive took 2h45' from our house to the Boston parking garage; 6 mi , 55' to Zakim Br. Lots of good CME input, all sitting, then about an hour drive (4.5mi direct) to this place in Somerville. "Motion is lotion" someone said today. I was pretty stiff for the most part. Puzzling expression that "lucky stiff". Haven't got there yet, if taken literally.

SPS after work. Had been blue dome at noon but was 100% gray by 3pm or so. Did part of the XC course - the woods were so so re snow, ice, wet ground & dry. Did 4 400s on the track. 10' pace for a 400 was work, sl better with each though. Need more of it when track is clear.

Consider a pair of microspikes, put them on one dedicated pair of shoes & be spared of worry etc.

Estabrook woods in Concord. Beth sprung a trip to MA on me yesterday & this was one of the several benefits. Looked in my collection for Estabrook maps, only found one color one, 1/15,000. I thought there might have been something more recent than this which says on the back "10Nov'91, cloudy & chilly. Lots of people. Still can't get it together. No results when I left shivering". I had the woods to myself today. It was sunny and in the high 30s. Start was at the end of Estabrook Rd., a place I've known for some 30 years and have watched the already old, gentrified area become more & more so. Parking at the end of the road is much more restricted than in the past. Did an abbreviation of the red course from Nov 10. So many hardwoods allowing so much light that it seemed novel. Generally open, some rock, the tiniest of back dots as symbols for same.

Fun to orienteer on a course 27+ years later. Pretty sure I found the intended rootstock, walls were all still there, boulders mapped OK, paths were mostly still there though some took close inspection. One point, near the end, was a small building in an open area. I could see a mammoth structure about where it had been. It seemed to be a barn with associated an equally mammoth house on Hugh Cargill Rd., a road Beth and I once attended a Christmas season party in the early 80s. Nothing recognizable now. Estabrook was once accessible out the back door from Mrs. Smith's house where I rented her second floor on Barnes Hill Rd, on the map - not so much now, not due to houses but due to more intense privacy messaging. Fun time and juxtaposition of old & new.

Estabrook

27 years later, still the same (5th circle)

Slo-Go at SPS. Warm day, 47F at noon. Bike path & campus. I really need more miles.

Indeed a lousy weather day. UNO was very lucky with the past two local meets, sunny days directly followed or preceded by misery.

Beaver Brook, UNO annual club meeting. Pleasant, sunny, warm start to December. Did brown, considered green - seeing the green course later made me wish I had. The section NE of the barn is rather gently rolling & very much different from the woods on the opposite side of the wet areas separating the map. Brown, green & red shared most of the same points on the far side.

Lost some 3' total. To #2, not 200m, I looked up/ahead early and noted the knoll I believed I needed to navigate to...which I did. Along the way, I saw a flag on a rock feature about the same time I was crossing an intermittent stream...what the map indicated was my point. I told myself that stream was a "newbie", and there would be the intended one, as mapped, on the far side of the knoll and right beside it, the rock face & my flag. Didn't happen. No stream or potential for one, a sinking feeling. I'd run by the flag, crossed the intermittent stream which I'd dismissed. The problem was my deciding I had it right ('unmistakable knoll') pretty early on in the leg. About 1.5' lost.

#4, maybe 150m, was a small rock face in green and called for utmost map contact, pace & attention. Maybe 1.75' lost. #9 was in the same path network that confused me last December 3 (on a very nearby feature). I came on a different path & it was straight forward except for my thinking the flag was on top of the big knoll but it was at east foot and pretty far from the top - so some bewilderment in the making but rather quickly snuffed out

Meeting afterward discussing, among numerous things, the schedule for next year. Offered, along with Steve Tarry, for a Bear Brook meet around 4/20 if there are no DRED hurdles to snuff it out.

Beaver Brook

Brown - Splits