Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Ice, Ice Baby


See that shimmer of ice on the river? It's ice, ice baby. This past week, we were hammered by chinook winds and had a great meltdown. I was lovin' up the warm temperatures, but my trails were left in a frozen, solid, treacherous skating rink. It was a grey day for a run, but I got myself 3 1/2 hours of solid running. Thank-you Kahtoolas. I love you.



Saturday, I got myself a visitor: the lovely Neasa joined me for a run out the back door and up Sulphur Mountain. We walked most of it, because I was feeling tired and sluggish, plus I wanted to visit! It's hard to socialize when you are running up a mountain, heavy breathin' and gasping. Thanks, Neasa!

It was such a great day, I headed back out the door and went up to Lake Minnewanka to check out the state of the ice on the lake. I thought maybe, just maybe it might be in good enough shape to go for a ride on the bike. I threw the Frankenbike in the car, a mean looking cyclocross bike with studded knobby tires. I was hoping for a ride on the lake...


But no such luck. Fresh snow on ice meant Frankenbike couldn't get any traction. I did however, go for Run #2 right down the middle of the lake. The funny part was that I forgot my runners, so I ran in my Nike snow boots and Kahtoolas. It didn't matter, because there was nobody around to point and laugh at me! It was so beautiful and I got to see the sun go down on the mountains from the middle of a giant frozen lake. And I got me some quality Leslie solo time....

My snowy foot prints

To round out the weekend, Stu and I went for a great tour some place new. For a longtime, I've wanted to walk up this little mountain...with it's flat easy slope I've been wanting to go up it for quite some time to check out the view.

The destination.

The view was great! We managed to get a few runs in as well - 4 laps on a real nice little snowy slope. Sweeeet. A nice way to round out the weekend.

9 comments:

Jo Lynn said...

Dang, that's a lot of snow! Beautiful pictures. ;)

HappyTrails said...

We have Frankenbikes, too!!! Ours are old frames with lots of old and mismatched pieces/parts all thrown together - our foul weather beasts!!!
:-)
K

Meghan said...

Hi!

See you soon! Let's do a little lip syncing and other early 90's reminiscing then.

Kay'? ;)

Leslie said...

Sure Megs....Ice! Ice! Baby!

Bruce Grant said...

dang, you sure live in a pretty place, Leslie. I like it here on the Coast, but ahhh....real mountains...

And I have to say, you're one of the smily-est runners I know of, your happy pictures infect me with enthusiasm to get out there as well!

Have a swell weekend!

Bruce

CoyoteGirl said...

Gorgeous! So majestic.

Deanna Stoppler said...

nice photos gal! love the sunshine. we finally got a couple days of sun this weekend too. ya!

Leslie said...

Hi Jo Lynn!
Yup, my backyard is snowy and wonderous. But I still enjoy your backyard....

Hi K!
Why am I not surprised you have a Frankenbike? Keith is a total bike geek. Actually, he's a bike rep which is a good thing if you're a bike geek.

Hiya Bruce!
Thank-you, I ran myself into the ground this weekend. I suspect you and I enjoy the same things...you know, Pina Coladas...walks in the rain...AND very, very, very long runs in beautiful, challenging, rocky mountain places!

Hi CG! Welcome back!

Hi Deanna...I suspect you went and beat yourself up this weekend too...hope it was awesome.

Matt Hart said...

i am putting ice ice baby on my ipod today for my run on the snow.. and ice ice baby!