My Running Week in Photos

Lake Minnewanka - C-level Viewpoint

Monica

Mount Inglismaldie

Riding the coal train - Lower Bankhead

Swingin' - Johnson Lake

Johnson Lake

Sulphur Ridge line: as seen from Mount Rundle

Asphalt sucks. It was short.

Mount Rundle

Tail end of 7 hours

Angela cruisin' Lake Minnewanka

Nikki and Monica

Single track

Mike

Spring Break-Up!

Buh-bye Ice

Shoreline

It's Cold.

Quad Soak.

Refreshed!

Happy Nikki!

Anticline

Nikki, Monica, Mike - 20k in the middle of nowhere

Nikki, Monica and Me

Dry Creek

Over There!!

River Run - Bow and Cascade

Five Finger Fun

Home Sweet Home :)

Smells like Spring.....

After last weekends deep snow adventure, I was very pleased at the recent arrival of.....could it be? Warmer weather? A thaw? Possibly, maybe, hopefully.....it smells like spring!!!

I awoke at 5:30 in the morning - because there was a couple of robins having an orgy outside of my bedroom window and they were screamers!! Also, surprise-surprise.....it was getting light out. I drifted back to sleep only to be awoken by the alarm dog, barking at a large bull elk grazing on the teeny tiny sprigs of greeen grass that magically appeared when the snow receeded. Hey - the snow receeded!! A week ago - shin deep, but the last two days it disappeared. I decided to get up and have a hot tub, only to be assaulted by the smells of spring in the backyard. The smell of wet, rotten, grass mixed with a winters worth of Norman doggie-doo.......ah! The smells of spring!!

Keith and I have two Adirondack chairs in the middle of our kitchen - on most mornings, one of our favorite rituals is to sit in them, visit, drink coffee and wait for the hot cereal to cook. It's a great ritual. Our friend, the sunbeam is finding its' way into the kitchen much earlier these days for us to enjoy. I lazed the morning away, waiting for it to get a few degrees warmer before I ventured out for my last long run pre-Miwok (yay!!). I'm sure glad I waited, because by the time I got out there - the sun had heated up the day, melted everything in its' sight and things were warming up and the smell of spring was everywhere.

I decided to drive up to Lake Minnewanka for my run and was hopefull that there might be some semi-dry trail and signs of spring. I wanted to run in the sun and feel the heat on my skin. The shoreline trail was fantastic - warm, drying up quickly, sunny and glorious.....

Oh my Gawwwwwwdd.....Leslie's in a short sleeved jersey!!

Officially, Saturday April 26th was the first day that I put on shorts and a T-shirt!!! Woooohooo! Alright, I had to start in arm-warmers and a vest, but the moment I hit the Lake Minnewanka shoreline, it was hot and sweaty. Yessssss! Hot and sweaty! Surely, a sign and smell of spring - a sweaty Leslie. The lake is still frozen, but the south-facing trail was dry.

The smells of spring were everywhere. The smell of cold snow and rock in the shade, the smell of sheep shit on Sheep Point (Norman isn't the only one leaving a winter's worth of souvenirs)....the smell of the sun warming the pine forest, the smell of warm dirt on the trail, the smell of moist rotting leaves and still lingering, the smell of ice and snow.

Deep in Sheep Shit - Sheep Point

The Shoreline Trail

The view from the campground

This campground on Lake Minnewanka shoreline is another one of my favorite summer places. We once spent a long weekend here on one of the busiest weekends of the summer in the National Park - and saw a couple other people.

Another sure sign of spring, my bear spray is now easily accessed on the side of my hydration pack where it will remain for spring, summer and fall! Though I didn't see any signs, no diggings, no footie prints, it is now bear season. The G-bears and B-bears have woken up and they love the Minnewanka shoreline for the same reasons I do - it is the first place to melt and they love the smells and tastes of spring.....don't we all??

Ice Capades - Lake Minnewanka

Today, my friend Steve and I started the day off right - at a breakfast buffet! Mmmm-mmm. Coffee. O.J. Bacon. Omelette. Waffle. Fresh Pineapple. More bacon. Hash browns. Croissant. Now that's a breakfast. Have I mentioned how much I love food these days? It is all consuming. My co-workers are amazed. I'm like a 5 year old. Time to feed the kid before a melt down occurs. Constantly. Hungry. Must eat. Now.

Needless to say, we arrived at the trailhead 20 minutes later with VERY full bellies. Fortunately, we drank enough coffee to compensate for the lull our bodies should have been feeling trying to digest all of the grease we had just consumed. But no problemo - neither Steve or myself suffered any ill effects of our pig-out. Yeah! Digestive system of steel. I must say, I didn't need a lot of food for this 4 hour run, my big breakfast served me well. I just drank 2 litres of water and calories, had a little late run snack and was good for the duration!

The trail turned from snow and ice, into lovely rolling DRY singletrack very quickly. The sun was heating up the south facing shore of the lake and before we knew it, we hit the 8k mark. The conditions had improved quite a bit in the past week. Shortly after that, the trail turned snowy again so we headed down to the shoreline to take a look at the lake. We thought that the shore conditions might be better for running.

Shoreline - Lake Minnewanka

So we get down to the lake to have a look, but the shoreline slope is kind of tricky, so we end up further out on the ice. At first we were tentative and slightly nervous on the ice so we were staying close do the shoreline. Well. Next thing Steve is WAY out on the ice and he is jumping up and down and saying "Looks good!" That still wasn't terribly reassuring, but when I got out a bit further onto the lake you could actually see the ice depth. It was 3 feet deep!

3 feet = very safe!!

After that our run turned into the Ice run. The Ice Marathon. The Ice Capades. It was so much fun! I was a little giddy running down the middle of a giant frozen lake - in the sunshine and we were having so much fun we covered a fair amount of distance. We ended up at the Lake Minnewanka warden cabin for a quick snack and photo to proove we made it in March.

Let's go right down the middle!

All total - a four hour run in an incredible place. The perspective from the middle of the lake was very cool. It was cool to be looking at the familiar mountains from a view that is usually only accessible by boat!

Just running along!

So much FUN!! This doesn't happen often that you get to enjoy such a unique perspective - usually the snow on the lake is too deep or it is not frozen....but seldom frozen, clear, flat and perfect with just enough snow to give you a little grip. O.K the icy bits were slippery, but we were having too much fun to let it bother us.

Get out the sunscreen - the glare off the snow and ice was bright!

Yiiiihaw! Another great day, but I do believe that ice is not going anywhere for a LONG time. Definately a unique opportunity for a run "on" the lake and a special surprise for us - neither of us had ever got to run down the middle of Lake Minnewanka before!

Five Hour Run Johnson Lake and Lake Minnewanka

Lots of signs of spring today, the occasional stretch of dry trail (gasp!) and rock and ice. It was the earliest I have ever run Lake Minnewanka shoreline and the patches of dry trail were few and far between the stretches of treacherous black ice! I was distracted today, mostly by the scenery and the slippery footing. I felt like I was not moving forward to quickly but could have gone for hours! Enjoy my run.