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Today I woke up at 4 a.m. and drove to St. Catherines to meet the relay racers of the Blaze race. The gang had been running stages nonstop since Tuesday and seemed pretty fatigued, but the mood was optimistic with only a couple legs to go. I met organizer Simon Donato at the end of one of his legs.

Ultimately they finished the Bruce Trail in just under 4 days, averaging 9-10 km/hour day in and day out. One runner, Patrick, said he ran some sections at a 4 minute/km pace. Which is, ahem, approximately my road marathon pace. Remarkable. Congratulations Adventure Science atheletes. I have renewed inspiration to get back on the trail.

Next it was off to a reporting assignment in Honeywood, where a group of investors has quietly amassed 6,000 acres of prime agricultural land adjacent to the Niagara Escarpment. The Highlands Group, as they are known, has been buzy bulldozing houses and barns, drilling wells and clearing forest – and is also trying to purchase the nearby railway to Owen Sound. Hmm. The group finally admitted this week that they intend to dig a gravel pit. Concerned citizens met today.

Revisiting last year's run.

I took a moment to relive last year's run. Same spot, different season.

Spring!

Spring!

Saturday 2 May
Distance: 11.5 km
Time: 1.5 hours
Avg speed: 7+ km/h
Total distance to date: 629 km
Distance to go: 256 km

First (and final) run of spring

Flowers were all abloom on the Bruce when I got out on the first weekend of May. This section around the Bayview Escarpment made an easy loop. By logging an extra 3 km or so on the road (making the total run just over 14), I was able to double back to the car. Meaning I didn’t have to beg anyone for a drive. Further sections will be more complicated. At least I got in one springtime run. Next time it will be all summer and green, and my banner photo will be out of season yet again. Who has time to blog?

What is this strange furry tree?

What is this strange furry tree?

Do not touch ANYTHING. Courtesy of the Meaford Tank Range.

Do not touch ANYTHING. It may explode and kill you!

Welcome, Lydia!

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Completion of the Bruce Trail has been delayed (happily) until further notice by the arrival, three weeks ago, of a new runner in the family. Baby Lydia is stretching her legs and building her fat reserves. Her father is catching up on work and sleep. Her mother is trying to figure out how to get the whole family operation bunded up and out the front door before we can think about making our way three hours north for some hiking and trail running. A family assault on the Bruce awaits. Stay tuned!

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Clifftop view of West Duffins Creek

I found a new hiking trail in Pickering

Well, not exactly a new trail. There’s an old wooden sign, barely readable, that says the Seaton Hiking Trail was build in the ‘75 and ‘76. But it’s new to me. I had to exercise the dog, had to get out for a run, and had to go buy a baby car seat at Sears. Driving to Sears entails a long drive one way or another, so I combined my missions, went to the Sears in Pickering, and checked out the Seaton Hiking Trail.

This trail follows closely along the floodplain of West Duffins Creek, climbing in places to overlook the valley from steep bluffs (and one quite dangerous cliff). There are decent maps of it available here, though I found out about it from reading about the 78 km Seaton Trail Race that’s held here every April. The race website describes it as “a 13 km out and back along Duffins Creek featuring single track trail, water crossings, tuff [sic] long hills, lots of ups and downs, twists and turns and roots and rocks.”

Yes, the hills are tough. And they are sick. Running was rough with much of the forest still frozen over. The ground was a mixture of ankle-deep mud and slick ice, and I wish I’d brought my La Sportivas with the hobnail studs so I could have a proper run instead of slipping and sliding over the ice and muck. Ranger and I got good and yucky and we didn’t even have to pay to enter a race.

From the race description I judge that the route is 13 km one way, 26 km if you do the whole thing out and back. In an hour and a half I made it less than halfway out and back, so there’s lots more to explore when the ground is dryer.

I took some photos from my new Canon PowerShot A590 that I bought for $120 US to replace the considerably more expensive S50 that I dropped on the stone floor at the cottage. So far I think it takes worse pictures than the S50, but at least it’s lighter and easier to carry. It’s nice to have a running camera again (known as “baby camera” by some).

There's a cool train bridge over the creek. Rumble rumble.

There's a cool train bridge over the creek. Rumble rumble.

Here's the token Ranger shot.

Here's the token Ranger shot.

Sundown.

Sundown.

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Every winter runner needs to try these

This winter I got so frustrated running on Toronto’s icy trails that I tried studding an old pair of my running shoes with tiny brass wood screws.

The following should have been obvious, but I will say it anyway. The problem with putting screws in your shoes is that it’s easy to get the sharp end to point up into your foot, but hard to get it to point down into the ice. My homemade studs were a failure.

La Sportiva found just the thing in the world of auto racing: tiny spikes for hand-studding rally-car tires. They’re made of a fancy wear-resistant tungsten alloy with a flat corkscrew base that will embed firmly into the lug of a shoe without pricking into your feet.

La Sportiva now sells this little hand-studding kit for $45, which comes with a studding tool and 20 studs—enough for one to two pairs of shoes (replacement studs sans tool are $18).

I started off conservatively putting five studs each into my worn-out Crosslites (the ones I ran the first 550 km of the Bruce Trail in). The thick lugs in the Crosslites are well suited for holding studs, but I think you could probably stud any running shoe. My package came with a couple of different screw lengths, with the shorter ones better for the thin forefoot section of a road shoe.

Five studs per shoe was enough for excellent grip on ice. I ran post thaw-freeze cycle on completely packed and refrozen trails, and even walked over icy wave-blasted rocks beside Lake Ontario. With the remaining 10 studs added, I could have gone mountaineering.

dsc_0001crop-largeThe metal nipples protrude a good 4-5 mm from the sole so they’d wear out fast on pavement, but they’re great on ice or anywhere else serious traction is required (log driving?). I carry my studded shoes in my bag when I run from home to the trails and then quickly change shoes once I get off the pavement.

This is the best grip solution for icy winter running I’ve seen yet. Unlike strap-on traction devices, there’s nothing to wrap around the top of your feet and rub or interfere with circulation, and nothing that can slip or fall off.

The studs can be removed so if you wanted you could stud your trail shoes for winter and de-stud them in the spring. I was happy to give my old trail shoes a second life as winter ice runners. So now I own regular trail shoes, winter trail shoes, good road shoes, second-tier road shoes, and Nike Free “barefoot” shoes, plus new tap dancing shoes (y’know, those old road shoes with the brass screws in the soles?). But that—my role in keeping Chinese cobblers and closet organizers employed—is a whole other story.

Sunday 15 February
Distance: 17 km
Time: 3.5 hours
Avg speed: 5 km/h
Total distance to date: 617.5 km
Distance to go: 267.5 km

Dis-snow-llusionment

Snowshoe running on hard, refrozen crust after the previous week’s thaw made for faster progress. I gotta say though, sunny winter days are better spent schussing than trudging.

Running (I use the term liberally) on snowshoes is like being inside the guts of a Zamboni. Raquettes (oh so onomatopoeically named by the French) kick up a helluva lot of snow. That’s how Ranger the Indefatigable Snowdog gets the cute white stripe on his nose. I get a similar stripe from my waist to my toes. I tied my jacket around my waist and quickly found my unzipped pockets filled up like a couple of sandbags with crushed ice. I got crushed ice in some other places too. It’s, like, completely impossible to be warm and comfortable when you’re coated with melting snow. The cottage hot tub becomes essential post-run therapy. Without it I would still be shivering.

So all you people who are trying to popularize the sport of snowshoe running, don’t look to me. It is good exercise. It is an easy and fun way to get out into the winter backcountry. But skiing is better.

I went telemark skiing at Beaver Valley on Sunday morning. It was my first day on the hill this season, thanks to all the running and life getting in the way. That spoiled me for the day, and also caused my late start on the trail and the short distance of my run. I had to quit early and call Tory to come pick me up (thank you!) because entering the Bayview Escarpment Provincial Nature Reserve as planned would have meant running (literally) out of daylight. Then I had to figure out how to keep warm for 45 minutes standing around in tights.

Survival Scenario

I decided to light a fire because I’ve been carrying around a little survival kit with matches and a lighter, and I’d always figured I could light a fire if I hurt myself and started to freeze to death. I burned up my entire box of matches. I had to fight with Ranger for every twig because Tory and I did not take life-and-death fire lighting into account when we encouraged Monsieur de-Ranger to play tug-of-war with sticks (so cute!). He dismantled the fire with gusto as fast as I could build it.

Oh what fun it is to laugh and sing…while losing all sensation in one’s fingers.

Notes to self: Bic lighter is impossible to use with cold hands if you don’t de-childproof it first; carry fire-starting materials; carry a knife; tie up dog before trying to collect firewood; do not plan to rely on fire for warmth—stick to jumping jacks.

Spring can’t come soon enough.

How long is the Bruce Trail?

I’ve mentioned before that the Bruce Trail is in constant flux. With some recent long additions (Beaver Valley and Bayview Escarpment extensions), the Bruce Trail has grown quite a bit lately. I figured it must be up over 900 km by now. But not quite, according to the Bruce Trail Conservancy, whose administrator just informed me that the total length is now 885 km.

The 25th edition of the Bruce Trail Reference Guide, released last August after I started the run, includes most of these changes. Trail changes since August are posted online here. According to the Conservancy:

“The trail changes listed on the website are for the 25th edition (things are always changing when landowners change their mind about letting us use their land or trails need redirecting for safety reasons). The new edition came out in August so any changes after about August 1st will apply to the new edition.”

It pays to keep on top of such things. Last summer Tory and I were on the new Beaver
Valley section when we ran into two tired, disoriented hikers who were many hours along a trail that didn’t appear on their map. They were just coming to realize that this wasn’t the convenient detour back to the trailhead that they’d imagined it to be.  We helped direct them to nearest road so they could hitchhike back to their car. I had some equally bewildering moments of my own at the start of the trail before I figured out to update my maps before the start of every run.

According to the updated trail length, I have 284.5 km to go – just a tad further than I calculated after my last run.

I just got a comment from a guy named Wolfmaan who’s planning on hiking all 900 km of the Bruce Trail from end-to-end nonstop and almost entirely barefoot! He’s going to start at the beginning of June and take a very civilized 60 days to complete the hike.

Speaking of end-to-enders, this is a bit out of date, but did I remember to mention that one of the commentators on my blog, Rhona, finished the whole trail last Canada Day? She and her partner/co-hiker Michael started it on the previous Canada Day and finished it within one year in a total of 31 days of hiking. (I can add that to the mounting evidence that running isn’t saving me any time.

Sunday 11 January
Distance: 20.5 km
Time: 5.5 hours
Avg speed: 3.7 km/h
Total distance to date: 600.5-ish km
Distance to go: 278.5-ish 284.5 km

Cold, wet feet just waiting to happen.

Cold, wet feet just waiting to happen.

I had this idea that it would be just brilliant to snowshoe in running shoes, and that instead of buying something purpose-built for snowshoe-running (surely such a thing exists, though I haven’t seen it), I would transform my $30 closeout Adidas trail runners into winter footwear with the addition of $60 Gore-Tex socks. So far, so good.

About halfway through my run my left snowshoe broke through creek ice into knee-deep water (at which point I noticed the bridge). Although only my left foot got soaked, this seemed to give both socks the idea to open the floodgates. By the end of the run the right foot was as wet as the left.

It turns out that snowshoes kick a lot of snow back up onto your legs. If you wear tights, this snow builds up, glacier-like, into balls of ice which gradually melt into your leggings, which, in their engineered space-age way, do a great job of wicking all that moisture into the $6o waterproof socks you’ve got them tucked into. By hour five I could not feel my feet. I was running on numb clubs desperately trying to pound some blood through them. The feeling came back when I hit a long section of road and picked up speed. Back at the cottage, I wrung about a quart of water out of my socks which I’m convinced would have turned to ice had I stopped moving on the trail, my feet changing state with them. Back to the drawing board in the footwear department.

Annoying features of the Bruce Trail in winter include:

1. Cedars bowed over with snow in huge booby-trap clumps, concealing dog-swallowing hollows (Ranger hates these now), and rendering the trail indistinguishable from the surrounding dumping-snow-down-your-back forest.

2. The din of snowmobiles, close enough you can choke on the fumes. I’ve met some very decent sledheads. I understand that snowmobiles are one of the great modern inventions that have changed life and landscape in northern communities for the better. I even tried snowmobiling once as the open-minded participant in a media junket (about which I still have nightmares). However, as a form of winter recreation, there is no excuse for it. The death of snowmobiling may be the single greatest benefit of a warming planet.

3. Wet feet. See above.

4. Impossible to see trail. White on white. See Day 19.

5. Slow progress. I did manage to break into sort of a shuffling running gait on snowshoes for much of this day’s distance, but it’s still only half my summer speed.

6. The Bruce Trail’s ever-increasing distance. This has nothing to do with winter but it is annoying. The members of the Bruce Trail Conservancy have been working like beavers to piece together additional sections of the Niagara Escarpment to tack onto the existing Bruce Trail. Power to them. But could they just please hold off the unveilings until after I’ve passed by? Earlier this year when they opened 30-odd kilometres of new trail in Beaver Valley, it added a day to my run. And now, just when I thought I was only a day from Owen Sound, I discover the “Bayview Extension”, a new 57(?) km addition along the Bayview Escarpment. Right now the trail seems to be growing faster than I’m running it; at this rate I’ll never be finished. The Bruce Trail is an elastic thing. It’s like a river you can’t step into twice. Maybe that’s why some people hike it over and over again. I don’t know if the Bruce Trail has hit the 1,000 km mark yet, but if not I’ll bet there’s some earnest committee out there gunning for it.  They should have a party. There are probably folks who won’t be happy until the Bruce Trail passes through both poles. There is really no limit to how far you can travel between A and B.

Complaints aside, it feels like I’m the only one out here hiking the trail in the middle of winter, and that’s cool. When I do come across other snowshoe tracks, rarely, I feel mildly disappointed at the loss of solitude even as I pick up speed. I’ve spent some significant time cesspooling about how I could have finished the trail last summer if I’d been more committed, devoted more weekends to it and put in longer days, but I think the full seasonal experience is still the better way to go, richer in memories and all that.

I can say that now. I’m wearing dry socks.

Saturday 10 January
Distance: 12.2 km
Time: 3.5 hours
Avg speed: 3.5 km/h
Total distance to date: 580-ish km
Distance to go: 299-ish km

Cornfields in snow.

Cornfields in snow.

The problem with blogging 9 days after a run is that it’s hard to recall what happened. Remember a substance called paper on which you wrote in ink? I should resurrect that technology, at least to hold onto the thoughts before I can commit them to cyberspace. I would be a poor oral historian. I once read a book by a Northern explorer who wrote that the Inuit thought white people had terrible memories because they were constantly writing things down. In my case this is true; I am quintessentially white in this regard. I have one week, tops, before the details cloud over.

The 3.5 hours is a rough guess; it may have been four. I remember that I was moving about 3 km/h and I finished in the dark. After dark, in fact. The Bruce Trail in winter is hard enough to follow during daylight, marked as it is with white blazes on trees quilted by windblown snow. Whoever selected low-impact white did not have winter hiking in mind. Imagine yourself scanning a snow-blanketed forest of white-speckled maples and beeches for white blazes. Then imagine dwindling daylight making it increasingly difficult to distinguish the particular textural and reflective qualities of paint versus snow. The good thing about snowshoeing is you can always retrace your steps, although too much backtracking and second guessing further decrease an already abysmal average pace. I was fortunate that the trail shared a path with a snowmobile trail for the final few hundred metres out to the road at exactly the moment when dusk turned to darkness. (For mothers reading this, there was a backup plan: use my headlamp and compass to follow a westward bearing, not very far, until I intersected the road. Plus, I have resolved to end future hikes sooner.)

Ranger came with.

Ranger earned his snow stripes.

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