PIcture Perfect Day at Lake Isabelle.

Apparently I suck at taper week.  Was supposed to have an easy 45 minute recovery run today with maybe a few strides (sprints) but the mountains were calling and instead I went for a 3 hour hike.  But can you blame me?

Hard to take a bad picture at Lake Isabelle.

The lake is scary low for the 3rd week in July.  All that rocky area should be lake this time of year.

Strummer sez hiking at 11,000' is hard work.

A rare moment of Strummer lying down and relaxing.

Even rarer than the albino grasshopper from yesterday.

I'm not sure if he's really an albino or what but he was here again today and he's still white so it's not that he was molting which is a more common reason for white grasshoppers.

Where was I?  Oh yeah, pretty mountains.

Still a bit of snow/glacier up high.

It's a bit early for the wildflowers but a few have started to bloom.  Paintbrush is probably my favorite.

This is one dogwalk he'd better not miss his contact on.

The hike was a bit naughty as far as training goes but I was itching to get up to the high country and Jonny was too and it was such a perfect day for it.  The elevation gain is small, it's mostly a very easy hike with not a lot of climbing but there are some steep bits and we went for about 1/2 an hour on the steeper trail above the lake.  And I probably went on a little too hard/long of a mountain bike ride yesterday.  Still I'm sure I'll be fine by next Saturday.  Will have to do some extra resting in the next few days to make up for it.

Skiing at Brainard

I had a beautiful day of back country skiing up near the Brainard Lake Recreation Area with one of my friends who's also been laid off.  It's about 50 minutes of driving on icy, snow packed twisty mountain roads to get there but the roads were plowed and sanded and I drive like a little old lady in those conditions so it was no problem.

The combination of the 10,000 ft elevation and steep, hilly trails made for a challenging day.

Waldrop Trail

It's been years since I've skiied on the Waldrop Trail and I'd forgotten how challenging it is with some super steep hills on a huge camber with turns and rocks thrown in for good measure.  I had to get off my skis and walk down a hill or two because the camber was too scary but I made it down one crazy ass steep hill without needing a new pair of pants.  Just.  The portion of trail shown above is a not so bad part but you can see how rolling it is.  I didn't realize it but it's rated as a black diamond (difficult) trail and I have a friend who took a bad tumble off his mountain bike and cut himself open on one of the hills.  We were rewarded with a nice view of Mt. Audubon at the end though so it was worth it.

  
Mt. Audubon is the highest mountain in Colorado that I've hiked to the top of.  It's something over 13,000 ft.  I don't like hiking for very long or very high above treeline, it's rocky and I find it boring, so I have yet to attempt a 14er.

I was bundled up in a lot of clothes for skiing but it was cold and I was dressed just right.

We opted to take an easier blue diamond (intermediate) level trail home (CMC South).

 

My friend insisted on shooting some video so you can have a laugh at me shuffling through the snow.  I do not have crazy mad kick-glide skilz.

I was on the lookout for moose the whole time since there'd been a number of sightings and we came across a guy who saw a pair of bull moose but they were about a mile away in the wrong direction and I figured that by the time we got there they'd be long gone.  Didn't see any this time but maybe that's a good excuse to make another trip up there.  I think I'll wait for the next snow though because the predictions for sunny skies and temps. in the high 40's, low 50's for the next week down here in town sounds to good to leave behind for the cold high country.  Maybe the agility field will even be melted by next week and we can get back to work on those darn weave pole entries.