Mt Rainier, he we come

Sarah and I are about to head to bed, and in the morning we depart on our next grand adventure to do the Wonderland Trail. It's 93 miles around Mt. Rainier and we're going to do it in 11 days. Each day isn't very much mileage, but a ton of elevation gain.

Here is a link to that profile map in an easier to read format.

Here is our itinerary:

8-31: Longmire Trailhead

8-31: Devils Dream

9-1: Klapatche Park

9-2: Golden Lakes

9-3: Mowich Lake

9-4: Carbon River

9-5: Mystic

9-6: Sunrise

9-7: Summerland

9-8: Nickel Creek

9-9: Paradise River

9-10: Longmire Trailhead

I've sure we'll have a great time and I'll post the pictures when we get back.

More Patio, more rain

So they did a little bit more on the patio this week, but then all work came to a halt as rain storms swept in and haven't let up for like 3 days. On the bright side, I haven't had to water my lawn. On the down side, my freakin' patio isn't done yet.

Oh, and Bela got hurt and I thought this was just pathetic enough to share. Now I remember why I have so many shop towels. For doggie triage.

Patio Update

So we decided that the big home improvement that we were going to do this year is put in a patio that we can use. Colorado is nice and sunny, pretty much year round, so having a huge patio to sit on and enjoy the weather is a must.

Our old patio in the back was too small to have a good sized table, plus our front porch and driveway was cracking, so we thought we could improve everything all at once.

We got a bunch of quotes, picked a contractor and put him to work.

His first job was to remove the crappy concrete, which they did in about half a day.

Soon they started setting forms for everything so that we could give our inputs into how it looks.

Then one day I came home an BAM, stamped concrete.

We're still waiting for them to finish the wall and seal the concrete, but hopefully it'll only be a few more weeks and we'll have a sweet place to hang out.

Flickr!

Wild West Relay

On Friday, I joined Sarah and a few of her track friends from Auburn to run a 197 mile race from Fort Collins to Steamboat Springs, CO. The team was made up of multiple All American runners, and even one multiple winner, so to say I was the weak link was being kind. The race was divided into 36 legs, with each of the six runners running, well, six legs if you do the math. Overall each person would run anywhere from 30 to 35 miles, much of it up and over two mountain passes. In fact, the motto of the race is "Get your ass over the pass." Things started off well with each of us running our first legs in 100 degree heat and sun. My first leg was 5.5 miles uphill as we climbed out of Fort Collins. My second leg was similar mileage, with two miles of steep uphill at the end, and at this point I started to feel my knee get sore, but more on that later. In the middle of the night, Caitlin was running a particularly long 9 mile leg, and we were following in our chase van. Knox, Caitlin's husband was driving and he said the brakes were getting soft. Since we were driving down a mountain, this was kind of a big deal. Within 30 seconds our brakes left us completely. Knox was able to stop the van by going in the ditch, and throwing it in park so that it ground to a halt. The next three runners all jumped in another teams van and got a ride to the next check station, and left Knox to figure out what to do with the van. Luckily, after the brakes cooled off, we were good to go and he was able to meet us at the next station where Caitlin handed the baton to me. Then my knee died. I did about 2 miles and then had to give up because my IT band was so swollen I couldn't run or walk. Sarah took over and we continued on as a 5 person team. In the end, the girls made up for my loss by running anywhere from 35 to 41 miles each. We ended the race with an average pace of 8:43 miles which put us in 4th out of about 20 teams. The whole time leading up to the race, Sarah complained about not being in shape, and how much she was going to walk, but in the end she kicked my ass and was the only runner to be able to run the final leg. I was definitely the slowest girl on the team. Pictures...