Trestle Run // Tour of New England 2018

Yes, finally our annual trip to New England. Amanda and I look forward to this trip all year. It's our best opportunity to see family and friends and do all of the things that we miss doing now that we live in Georgia. A few years ago we decided to turn this into a two-week trip and it's been one of the best things we've ever done. One week just isn't long enough to fit everything in. Honestly, sometimes two weeks isn't enough for everything we want to do, but we're still lucky that we're able to get back-to-back weeks off from work.

On to the 2018 edition of the Tour of New England. It actually turned out to be more of a tour of Massachusetts and Maine with a couple of diversions into New Hampshire this year. One of the things we didn't get to do due to some scheduling difficulty was a day in Vermont. That was a little bit of a bummer, but fortunately, I was able to get up there for a bit when I was home earlier in the year. That and Richardson's Ice Cream has maple walnut, so at least I still got to have my annual giant cone of that.

Before we headed back up to Boston, I jumped in the Dirty Spokes Haw Creek 10k trail race. I missed a bunch of Dirty Spokes races last due for a number of reasons, so I really wanted to make sure I made as many as possible this year. We ended up booking our flights home for the late afternoon, which gave me enough time to get over to Haw Creek and get the race in before leaving. I really planned it out well, because after the race I still had time to head down to Dutch Monkey and get a few post-race donuts.

As far as the how the race went, it went out fast. Very fast. Tim Spradlin, who is 54 and has been on fire in the short race series this season took it out at a blistering pace. I probably should have hung back a little bit but I jumped early and ran right on his heels for the first half mile or so. I tend to have issues settling in sometimes and the fast start ended up putting me out front solo fairly early. Things were all good for the first loop, but I really started to pay for it on the second. The heat, humidity, and fast start made the second lap of the course very tough and I was super relieved to be able to hang on for the win, which sealed the series win for me. I'll still have to run the final race, but barring injury, I'll be at that one.

I recruited a couple of friends from work to come out and do the race as well, so after I finished up cooling down with Mitch Novy, I met up with those guys and grabbed donuts and watched a little bit of the world cup before heading home and getting ready to fly to Boston.

Tour of New England
We started off our vacation with a few days at the Park Street Inn, a.k.a. my parent's house. I got some good mileage in on some of my favorite hometown routes. I hit an old favorite that runs past Amanda's old house in North Reading, the standby Peabody Street loop, and a cool run up to what used to be the Danvers State Hosptial - the inspiration for Arkham Asylum and now an apartment complex. We spent a fair amount of time by the pool and got in a beach day up in York and made sure to hit up a few of our favorite local spots to eat, namely Sam & Joe's pizza in Danvers.

I got a couple of nice runs on the Topsfield Rail Trail, including two workouts which allowed me to snag a KOM. I'm sure it won't last long, but it's fun to snag one or two of those on popular local routes.

After spending a couple of days of relaxing by the pool and on the beach we decided to get out and move around a little bit. I've been wanted to get up to Mt. Agementicus for a while but it's one of those things that I always think of after the fact. Fortunately, this year I thought of it early one day and we decided to take the short ride from York, Maine to check it out. It's a very small mountain. More of a large hill, but it's really close to the coast, so on a clear day you get some cool views of the Atlantic from the top.

We did a short hike around to the back side of the mountain and then up to the top before doing a little exploring around the summit. It's a pretty neat little spot actually. At one point it was a small ski hill and the remnants of the old chairlift are still at the top and the old lodge has been renovated and gets used for classes and groups. We were a little early for the wild blueberries, so we'll definitely have to get up there again if we go back later in the summer.

A few days later we made our way up to Portland to spend some with Amanda's sister and dad. We took the scenic route, stopping at Stonewall Kitchen for a big breakfast and hit up a few awesome little coastal towns along the way. As usual, I spent the next few days tramping all over the place catching up with some friends. I made a diversion into New Hampshire to meet up with my brother and best friend growing up to play some paintball

I drove down to Weare, New Hampshire to meet up with them and we got in a full day of paintball. We spent most of the day in the woods then got in a few games on the speedball field to close it out. AG Paintball was an awesome field to play at. One of the better ones I've been to in New England. We dominated a couple of games on their new S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier field and the castle field before the staff broke up our little team. It was a super fun day and I definitely miss getting out and playing paintball. It's such a fun sport to play. I'm hoping I can get a group of guys from work together for a day at some point over the next couple of months.

After a full day of running around in the woods, I made my way up to Topsham, Maine to catch back up with Amanda and her family for a nice dinner. The next day, I was up early again for an adventure run with Joe Reynolds. We'd been planning a run for a couple of months leading up to this trip and he picked out Camden Hills State Park in Camden, Maine. He picked me up early and we made our way up Route 1 along the coast to this awesome state park.

Rad Run // Camden Hills State Park //
Obviously, Acadia gets all the love in Maine. And while I would love to get up there at some point, Camden Hills is an absolute gem. It's nestled right on the coast and sits next to a picturesque lake and the Camden Snow Bowl - site of the Toboggan World Championships.

We started off on the Ski Shelter trail - an amazing bridle path trail that worked its way up to a small ski hut in the middle of the park. Our plan was to hit as many of the summits in the park as possible. There are something like seven or eight summits contained within the park, but we figured if we hit between five and seven of them we'd run around 10-12 miles.

*side note: These summits aren't overly high. Only three are over 1000 feet, so it's mostly rolling, with a couple of steep climbs mixed in.

Things started off really well. We rolled on the ski hut trail for a while and cut through the majority of the middle of the park easily enough. When we reached the Bald Rock trail we decided to skip Derry Mountain and Frohock Mountain since we'd end up having to run pretty much straight back to the car if we took that route. If we only knew.

We elected to climb up to Bald Rock Mountain, which sits at 1200 feet. I quickly found out how well Reynolds trail training has been going as he gapped me easily when we started going up. I was struggling a little bit on the steep and rooty climb, but I settled into my own pace and ground my way up to the top. When we reached the summit, we were treated with a spectacular panoramic view of the Penobscot Bay.

Leaving Bald Rock mountain we made our first misstep of the day. When we rejoined the Ski Hut trail and consulted our map, it appeared we needed to head a little further out on the trail to catch the next one we were looking for. That wasn't the case. It was basically right in front of us, but we had a nice 15-minute detour before figuring that out. No big deal. We planned on sticking to our original plan anyway and it would turn the run into a 14 miler. If we only knew.

We crossed paths with another runner, who told us the route he was going and we considered running with him for a few minutes, but he said he was looking for 3000 feet of elevation gain and that seemed a little aggressive for us so we went our separate ways. If we only knew.

Based on the route he told us he was taking we knew we needed to skip one left turn, so we took another look at the map and headed off into the woods on the Sky Blue trail. This trail was fantastic. It was a mix of a little bit of everything. Doubletrack, singletrack, soft dirt, pine needles, roots, rocks, ups, and downs. I have no clue how long we were on that trail but it was one of those times when you feel like you could just run all day. If we only knew.

After a super enjoyable section of trail, we reached a junction and headed left. At this point, we paused and looked at the map again, which had pretty much disintegrated due to sweat. We both thought it was the left that we were supposed to skip, so we decided to go back, make the right turn and then take our next left. Unfortunately for us, that left never came. We had misread the map and ended up popping out in someone's backyard. Uh oh. We looked at the map again and immediately realized our mistake. I pulled out my phone and we decided that our best bet was to jump on the road and make our way to the Maiden Cliff trail entrance, some two miles away.

This was a little bit of a blow to morale. We were 11 miles into the run at this point and we figured it was going to be somewhere around six or seven more miles before we returned to the car. There wasn't a whole lot we could do about it at that point, so we just started rolling on the road. Despite our sizable miscalculation, the morale was still fairly high between the two of us. We both seemed to just accept that it was going to be a while but all we could do was run so we might as well try to enjoy it and enjoy the fact that we were running together.

We stopped for a few minutes at a boat put in on Megunticook Lake and dunked our heads and hats in the water to cool off a little bit. This was a nice little pit stop because it reminded me to take a second to enjoy how amazing the area we were in was. Shortly after that break, we arrived at the Maiden Cliff entrance to the park. We stopped for a minute and looked at a good map, since ours was toast, and figured out our best path back to the car. The morale took a bit of a blow when we realized we had to go up and over Mount Megunticook, a 1000-foot, two-mile climb before we'd descend down to the car.

We ended up splitting up on the first part of the climb as Joe went into full grind mode and just clawed his way up the first half mile or so of the climb. I alternated between running, "power" hiking and just plain hiking for a while. I also broke out my emergency Untapped packet, which really saved me. I had a little bit of a mound conference with myself while I was downing the maple syrup and that helped me embrace the adventure of the day.

I was grinding my way up the trail 25 or 50 yards behind Reynolds and was just kind of in my own world for a little while. I was so in my own world that he had to call out when he had stopped and pulled over at an overlook. Without that, I would have blown right past it. I'm glad I didn't. The incredible view of the Snow Bowl and lake - along with the maple - gave us a second wind and we wound up running the rest of the climb together.

The climb actually got a little easier as we went along with a few ridge line breaks. It seemed like it took us forever but we eventually made it up to the summit of Mount Megunticook - the tallest mountain in the park. We took a minute at the top to grab a couple pictures and figure out the quickest way down, making sure we didn't end up doing something dumb and adding another handful of extra miles to the day.

From Megunticook we descended down to the Ocean Overlook, which instantly made all the effort of the climb worth it. The view was epic. You could see the bright blue water of Penobscot Bay as well as the idyllic town of Camden below. The low lying clouds that we saw on Bald Rock had moved away and it was picturesque. I could have just sat down and hung out at the Ocean Overlook for the rest of the day, but Reynolds told me he packed peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and they were waiting in the car. I hugged him, we got a few side eyes and then started to make our way down.

The descent was fun but definitely a little precarious. We were 16 or so miles into the run and had to be really careful not to get lazy and take a fall on the way down. We passed a bunch of groups of people heading up to the overlook on our way down and we probably scared a few of them, since we were borderline delirious at that point.

Finally, after descending nearly three miles we made it back to the parking lot. My watch said 17.8 miles, so 18, Reynolds phone said 19 miles and we ended up climbing more than 3000 feet. If we only knew indeed. We tried to find a spot to get into the ocean after finishing the run, but we weren't really willing to spent too much energy hiking down and decided to make our way back to Portland.

With Reynolds being in the craft beer industry, we stopped at a small brewery in Rockport and while they had solid beers they didn't have food, so we made the executive decision to go to McDonald's and get 20 McNuggets each. The last time I went to McDonald's was after a six-hour hike on Mount Washington with Ferenc in 2010. I got 20 McNuggets that day too. After Reynolds dropped me off back with Amanda I ate a bunch of Chinese food and passed out on the couch at like 8:30.

I spent the next day two days doing some very easy running on some local trails. Reynolds and I met up the next morning for a very mellow five at Bradbury Mountain State Park and the next day I went to Pineland Farms to explore their XC ski trails. Amanda's sister and her husband showed us a really cool breakfast spot in Yarmouth, so I tried everything on their menu before and after those runs.

A Couple More Rad Runs
I did a few more cool runs over the final week of our vacation, hitting up Breakheart Reservation in Wakefield, Mass. one day, running to Cape Neddick lighthouse and the Wiggly Bridge in York, Maine another and closed out the trip with a double loop of Trav's Trail at Maudslay State Park in Newburyport.

The run at Maudslay was a great way to close out the trip on the final day. I met up with Ben Kelley, an old friend of mine that I have known since elementary school but had not seen in forever. Ben is training for the Bay State marathon and he's into a little bit of everything when it comes to endurance sports. He's a running, cyclist, and AT skier, and we reconnected through Strava and Instagram. It was awesome to get a chance to catch up with him and chat about what he's been up to. I'm hoping to catch up with him again the next time I'm home for a run and maybe a little uphill skinning.

Tree Tapper 
My brother is really into the craft beer scene in Massachusetts and he's been singing the praises of Night Shift Brewing for a while. Coincidentally, Night Shift Brewing did a collaboration with DRINKmaple and announced that they were having a release party for their Tree Tapper, maple water pale ale while we were home. I had to go to that so Amanda and I made our way back to Massachusetts and grabbed my brother then made our way over to the brewery. Tree Tapper is pretty tasty. Now it doesn't taste like maple. The yeast feasts on all the sugar, so the maple flavor doesn't really come through, but it was still a good beer. Everyone knows I like to judge a beer on the 'how well does it go with pizza' test, so clearly that's why they had a pizza food truck for the release party. I'm happy to report it passed the test easily and paired nicely with both the standard cheese pizza and the more exotic BBQ pulled pork pizza.

Rising Tide
Since we were in Portland and visiting Reynolds we had to hit Rising Tide as well. I love this brewery. It's in a nice spot in the Back Cove where it's close to everything but still out of the way enough that it's not always jammed. They also have one of our favorite beers, Pisces, a Gose brewed with Maine seawater. Reynolds got us into it last summer and Amanda has been on a sour kick ever since. I personally love a Gose on a hot day after a bike ride or run. I think a lot of people are scared off by the salt, but that's the best part.

Gear Review // Myles Apparel // Switchback Shorts
I wanted to pack somewhat minimal for this trip and made the decision to go with just two pairs of running shorts. This decision worked out because I packed my Myles Apparel Switchback Shorts. I pretty much live in one pair of their shorts or another but these things have become my go-to everyday training shorts. The brand makes a few different pairs of go anywhere, do anything shorts. I'm actually wearing their Everyday shorts as I type this.

The Switchback shorts though are their first dedicated running shorts. They have a standard brief liner, which I prefer to the boxer brief liner, and feature both regular side pockets as well as a zipper security pocket. The zipper pocket fits an iPhone 8 plus, you notice it's in there but it fits and doesn't bounce, while a regular iPhone 8 fits with a small amount of movement, not an issue if you feel like listening to a podcast while running or something like that. I've used the zipper pocket for my phone, GoPro session, Untapped packet and house key - not all at the same time - and it's been ideal. They are six inches which give you enough length to grab a post-run coffee or sandwich without looking like a weirdo.

I highly recommend giving them a shot if you are in the market for an everyday training short.

What I've Been Into Lately
Ted King // King of the Ride Podcast
I have been really, really into Ted King's podcast since he launched it a month or so ago following his second win at Dirty Kanza. Sometimes podcasts with interview formats wear a little thin on me, but that's what I really like about this one. It's more of a conversation than a straight-up interview. Ted meanders through the career/life of his guest, keeping both the audience and the interviewee on their toes. He's had some really interesting guests that all have one thing in common, they love riding bikes. I really enjoyed the episode with Farid Noori, the founder of Mountain Bike Afghanistan.

Lance Armstrong's // The Move Podcast
Another bike-centric podcast for you. While I have my hangups about Lance it's hard to deny his knowledge of the tour. Granted, his knowledge of today's riders may be a little off at times, it is still interesting to hear him break down the stages. If you want really good analysis, listen to Dane Cash and Cosmo Catalano on the Recon Ride. They are better when it comes that, but I still find Lance's commentary interesting. I particularly enjoy the guest appearances by George Hincapie. He seems like one of the few people that can call Lance on his BS and it's actually pretty refreshing. Lance actually admitted that he was a dick at one point. It's interesting and that's how I'm looking at it.

Outside/In Podcast // Paintball History Lesson
While I was home I ended up joining a couple of buddies for a day of paintball in New Hampshire. Oddly enough while I was driving down from Maine to meet them, I put on an episode of Outside/In and it happened to be about the origin of paintball. I knew that the sport started in New Hampshire, but the nuanced storytelling was really interesting. It featured a couple twists that I don't want to spoil, but if you are a fan of paintball or a good origin story give it a listen.

What's Poppin on IG

s t a r g a z i n g #milkyway

A post shared by Austin Hittel (@ahittel) on Jul 3, 2018 at 5:07am PDT

My co-worker Austin Hittel spent some time in Yellowstone during his summer break and took some epic photos. I highly recommend checking them out.

RoadTrip New England- Picture of the day- Today’s photo is from. . 🏆 @thelostbuoy🏆 📸 Cape Neddick Lobster Pound (Maine) 👍🏻Thanks for the great #NewEngland capture! . —————————— We’d love to see your New England adventures! Want to be featured as our daily pic? 1️⃣ Please follow @roadtrip_newengland 2️⃣ Tag your pictures #roadtripnewengland 3️⃣ Please geotag the location 4️⃣ Must be your own photo —————————— Looking for the best pics in New England travel- Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island & Connecticut. . 👍🏻Thanks for sharing your adventures! . . . . . . . . . . #roadtripnewengland #newengland #maine #vermont #newhampshire #massachusetts #rhodeisland #connecticut #travel #ttot #travelphotography #roadtrip #roadtrips #roadtrippin #roadtripselfie #travelling #travelgram #travelblog #travelblogger #optoutside #bestoftheday #picoftheday #photooftheday #instagood #instagrammers #igers #igersusa #ig_northamerica

A post shared by Roadtrip New England (@roadtrip_newengland) on Jul 1, 2018 at 5:31am PDT

I had a little case of nostalgia from this photo.

#protectthishouse !!! #VT is my home, no such thing as half way crooks. #run #stowe #stowevermont #catamounttrail #greenmountains #ultrarunning #ultrarunner #epic #wild #endurance #wutang

A post shared by Wild Ferenc (@wild.neoteny) on Jun 24, 2018 at 4:14pm PDT

Josh Ferenc has been on a tear lately. I missed him while we were home, but he picked up the win at the Catamount ultra 25k back in July.

Rad Run: Mt. Monadnock with Ferenc

There is a lot more where this came from but I put together a video of my adventure run with Ferenc up Mount Monadnock from last week. We ran up the Pumpelly trail in Dublin to the summit then descended about half of the White Arrow trail, which was the wrong trail, before getting back on track and hitting the summit for a second time. The video includes an introduction to Josh Ferenc: Snake Idiot - Enjoy!

Catching Up

Time to catch up on the last few weeks of running and racing. If you actually read this regularly, then first of all thank you very much. You are awesome. Also you know that I was not too pumped about my performance at the Peachtree Road Race. In retrospect, I went out too fast and that's why things went "south". If I would have just run the splits that my workouts suggested, I probably would have been fine. Maybe I wouldn't have run as fast as I wanted to, but I would have easily finished inside the top 50, which was my goal at the beginning of the year. Instead of running smart, I decided to go for it and I paid dearly in miles 4 and 5, running nearly six-minute pace for the hilly section of the race. Oh well. It is what it is.

Fortunately, the weekend after the Peachtree debacle Amanda and I made our annual trip back home which meant that I got to spend a week road tripping around New England hitting up some of my favorite spots. We flew home on Saturday morning and Amanda jumped on the train to head down to Providence to spend some time with her dad and sister. I headed home and kicked off my vacation by jumping on my dad's bike for a 38 mile tour of the Tri-Town.

I rolled out on some Middleton back roads heading north into North Andover before hanging a right into Boxford. The virtually car-free roads were great and it was nice to be able to ride for miles without spending much time on main roads. Down in Georgia nearly every road is some kind of main thoroughfare unless you are really out in the country. I cut through Boxford and into Topsfield where I hit the rail trail. The rail trail made for some awesome riding, crushed gravel and dirt where super fun even on my dad's road bike. I let a pinch of air out of the tires and had a nice cushy ride. I followed the rail trail from downtown Topsfield to 97 in Wenham where I jumped back on the road and swung around into Danvers. I rode up to St. John's Prep where I got momentarily lost before getting back on track and heading back through Topsfield and into Middleton for the sprint finish behind Howe-Manning school.

This ride was a great way to kick of the vacation and really made we wish we had more non-paved greenway trail in Georgia. Don't get me wrong we have awesome greenways, but the dirt and gravel sections were a blast. After Saturday's ride, I ventured to York Beach with my parents for a family beach day. I ended up getting around eight miles in, running a loop from short sands beach up past the Nubble Light and along long sands then around and back to short sands. It was nice running along the water but warmed up quickly once I turned inland. I ended up cooling off in the water, which is a testament to how hot it was. The Atlantic in Maine is always frigid.

After knocking out Maine on my New England road trip, I headed up to the wilds of Vermont to meet up with  the 'last hero and only hope' Josh Ferenc. I got up to his version of the ATL (Athens Town Line) late Sunday night and we woke up early Sunday morning (thanks to his A-hole of a roster) to rendezvous with fellow Wild Endurance runner Greg Hammett and made our way to the White Mountains.

After driving to the bottom of Josh's driveway in his old Toyota Tercel, or whatever the hell it is, Greg and I both agreed it would be safer if we took my German engineered VW. Josh protested a little bit but I've hitchhiked twice in my life and both of those times I was with Josh. I don't view that as a coincidence. We drove up north towards St. Johnsbury then crossed over in to New Hampshire (state four if you are keeping track) and made our way to Franconia Notch near the base of Cannon Mountain.

I posted the video of our excursion, so I wont go to deep into it, but we started out at the Lafayette campground and run up the Falling Waters trail to where it meets with the Appalachian trail at the summit of Little Haystack. The way up was miserable. I was on the struggle bus early in the run since we went from the car to climbing nearly 3,000 feet in less than three miles. Despite my struggles on the ascent, I managed to claw my way up to the top using the cycling tactic of taking the lead when we stopped so I could drift back over time.

We took a short break at the top of Little Haystack, which was about an hour of running, all up hill I'll remind you, to refuel with some UnTapped and then continued on the AT along Franconia Ridge. We were treated to awesome views of the White Mountain National Forest and some really cool light clouds that rolled over the top of the ridge throughout the run. The views and terrain we awesome. Nothing but green mountains and rocky outcroppings as far as you could see.

We ran from Little Haystack up and over Mt. Lafayette (5,249 feet) and continued on along a spur trail before deciding to turn back and head down to the Green Leaf hut. We originally were hoping to continue on to Mount Garfield, but what appeared to be a short distance on the map, ended up being more like three miles, so we decided to make it a three hour run instead of a five hour one. After turning back we headed down to the AMC Green Leaf hut. For some reason the fact that these are called huts always made me thing they were small building that were kind of like a mountain side snack shack with a bunkhouse, but I was surprised at how big the hut was. It had a full kitchen and two bunkhouses with all kinds of cool stuff. I kind of wanted to just camp there for the rest of the day.

Free pancakes!

We stopped at the hut to refill our bottles for the final decent down the bridle path back to the car and I had to take advantage of the perfect mid run sack, free pancakes and UnTapped! After milling around for a bit and eating too many pancakes we got back on the trail to finish the run out. I was feeling pretty good when we stopped. My legs were obviously tired from the climbing, but I was running comfortably along the ridge and down to hut. That all changed after we started going again after our final stop. My quads were toast from descending and the last couple miles were a little rough. Fortunately, it wasn't long until we were off the mountain and I was able to keep it together until we got back to the car. After the run, we headed down to Lincoln to grab some pizza and swim in the Moosilauke Brook. The water was glorious and I could have hung out in the little spot we found all day, but after about an hour we decided to call it a day and head back to Vermont.

On the drive home I showed Josh how to view all the footage he got from the GoPro on my phone and he and Greg went through it all trying to figure out what was good and what was Josh's thumb covering the camera. When we got back to the house Josh broke out the vintage Cannondale that he had somehow picked up for 100 bucks. The thing is in great shape and probably actually worth 200-400 dollars. Since I was jealous I rode it every time that we hit out on the bikes for the rest of my stay.

The next couple days we got meh weather so that killed some of our plans to hit the local swimming holes, but we made up for it with a couple of really fun rides on some dirt roads around Vermont and a couple of nice and easy runs. We got to check out one of my favorite running spots in the area at Grafton Ponds, which is a biking, snowshoeing, and Nordic skiing spot in Grafton. I am planning on making a trip back up there in the winter and getting Amanda out on some of the snowshoe trails and hitting one of the local mountains for some downhill skiing as well. 

Last but not least, we made sure to stop by my absolute favorite VT spot to grab some ice cream. I went with maple walnut and maple cream because, Vermont. After three great days in the Green Mountain State, I made my way back home to Middleton to spend a little more time with my family before hitting the road again to spend a day on the beach in Narragansett, RI. After all of the driving around it was nice to park on the beach for a few hours. I ended up hitting five of the six New England state on the trip, all apologies to Connecticut, but I was happy with those five. It's kind of a weird way do a vacation when Amanda and I split up for most of the week, but we both had fun and got a chance to do some of the things we really like with some people that we rarely get to spend time with. 

Unfortunately, we had to cut our trip a little short again this year so I could make it back for a Dirty Spokes race, but as always it was great to be home. This trip always makes me miss New England big time. 

I almost forgot...here's what the Franconia Ridge run looked like.

Rad Run: Franconia Ridge in the White Mountains

As part of my annual trip back home to New England I spent three days up in Vermont with Josh Ferenc (Wild Neoteny), which included a trip over to the White Mountains in New Hampshire for a 2.5-3 hour run along a few trails in Franconia Notch. Josh, Greg Hammett and I ran up the Falling Waters trail to Little Haystack (4,760 ft.) and then along Franconia Ridge to Mount Lincoln (5,089 ft.) and Mount Lafayette (5,249 ft.) then down to the Greenleaf hut and eventually back to the parking lot below Cannon on the Old Bride Path.

The ascent was very challenging for me. It was really tough to go from the car straight up for the first hour. Once we hit the ridge things were a little easier, but I definitely gained some serious respect for running up there.

I gave Josh my GoPro to get some video of the adventure and while he was big on the selfie glamour shots he did get some pretty cool stuff. The summits were shrouded in clouds for much of the day but when it started to clear up there were some absolutely amazing views.

I'll post some pictures later, but for now I wanted to get the video up. We gained 4,072 feet for anyone wondering. The week before I ran 17 and gained a little over 2000 feet, so yeah that was a lot of vert for me.

Rad Run: Are You Afraid of the Dahhk

I feel like this is the most appropriate way to start off this blog. I don't know the origin of the image, but I had seen it somewhere before and it was the first thing I thought of when I sat down to start writing about my night time mountain adventure with Josh Ferenc. If that doesn't set the scene for you...try this one on for size.

That's the text I got from Josh on Sunday morning as Amanda and I made our way up to Vermont from my parents house in Massachusetts. As it says, Josh proposed a night run up Magic Mountain on Sunday night. Sometimes I regret going along with his suggestions, but I thought it sounded fun, so I agreed. After spending the day hanging out then consuming a higher than recommended amount of chicken wings Josh picked me up from the Grafton Inn  at 9 p.m. where Amanda and I were staying and we made our way to Timber Ridge, a defunct ski mountain in Windham, VT.

I know this was set out to be a night run, but it was wicked dahhk dude. Josh promised an "almost full moon", but on the drive it looked more like some sort of eclipse. We parked the truck at the base of Timber Ridge and each polished off the remainder of our Red Bulls. Despite not being able to see the moon, the stars were incredible. That has always been one of my favorite parts of the New Hampshire/Vermont/Maine experience, the stars are awesome. We don't get that in Georgia. There's a cul-de-sac every 20 feed and Atlanta has got some serious lightblubs. You get the star-filled sky a little bit in the North Georgia mountains but it doesn't compare to rural New England.

We fired up our headlamps and made our way from the parking lot up to the base of the mountain on a well packed snowmobile trail. While Timber Ridge doesn't operate as a ski mountain any more it is open to snowmobiling thanks to the Vermont Association of Snowmobile Trails (VAST). We followed the VAST trail, which from what I could tell (because it was dark) used to be a groomer that wrapped around the edge of the mountain. A green circle, with a couple of steep sections, that was probably more fun to ski down or snowmobile up than it was to run.

We slogged our way up the VAST trail but after a couple of minutes I was able to settle into a climbing gear and just grind my way up the slope trailing slightly behind Josh and way off the back of Ellie and Lena, who were setting a blistering pace. The snow was actually pretty good. It was softened a little bit by a warmer day but considering we were running on top of a couple of feet, we only dealt with minimal slipping. One of the great things about this being a night run was I couldn't tell how steep the trail was in front of me. I could only see what the headlamp was lighting up and it was all snow so it just looked like a white wall.

Here's an old image of when Magic Mtn owned Timber Ridge. Our route up is in red and the way down in black 

After 20-25 minutes of climbing things started to level out a little and we came to a snow bank on top of Timber Ridge. We followed a small break in the bank made by a snowmobile and things leveled off nicely. Following a few minutes of gliding we reached the summit of Magic Mountain. We pretty much ran right up to the chair lift before I realized we'd reached the top. It was a cool feeling to be at the top of the lift at night like that. They don't have night skiing, so we were the only people on the mountain and it was a combination of eerie quiet and peaceful serenity. With the stars and a slight wind, it felt like we were miles away from another human being. Then a guy came flying up lift trail on a snowmobile and ruined it.

We studied the trail map for a minute and even Josh, who is normally pretty relaxed when it comes the possibility of getting lost suggested that we should stick close to the lift. I agreed. It was really dark and while our headlamps light up the path in front of us, it would have been really easy to miss a trail sign and end up biting off more than we wanted to chew. We ended up doing a couple of short laps under the lift. It was awesome watching the girls bomb down the trail. Lena legitimately might have been going 40 mph down the trail.

It's tough to see but we ran down White Out and up Upper Magic Carpet

I don't know if it was that I was running with Josh, the cold night air, or the Red Bull but I felt like I could have run that loop 10 times. It was awesome! While we were doing our summit loops, the moon finally started to show itself through the trees. As promised it was epic. Nearly full and with a slight pink tint it lit up the trail on our way back. I wish I could have take better pictures, but even with my GoPro set to night mode it was too dark. I've got a couple of video clips that I might try to salvage some highlights from but I haven't had a chance to check them out yet.

After enjoying the sights for another minute or two at the top of Magic Mountain we made our way back down the connecting trail to Timber Ridge. We decided to head up to the summit of Timber Ridge before heading back to the car, which was a short climb from where the VAST trail connected with Magic. We shut our headlamps off for a few minutes and let the moon light the trail as we climbed up the gradual incline along a ridge line that led to what I thought was the decommissioned lift house at the top of Timber Ridge.

As it turns out...(according to NewEnglandSkiHistory.com) It was a cabin built on the footing of the former double chair that was featured in a 2014 episode of National Geographic's Building Wild. Yup, I found the episode. I haven't watched it yet but I'm looking forward to it. From the preview it looks like it give a good view of some of the steep terrain that we were dealing with. Also Josh needs to befriend these people immediately if not sooner.

Here's the link to the video. I couldn't get it to embed.
Top of the World

From their we bombed down the well traveled snowmobile tracks that led down Timber Ridge's main trail to the base lodge, which has been converted into a cabin lodge for the people that own the mountain. We finished our run on a small section of road before dropping back down into the snowmobile parking lot. Unfortunately, as soon as the car was in sight my heart sank.

"Did you really leave the dome light on?"

"Oh shit."

I left the dome light on in Josh's truck and was 1000 percent sure it wasn't going to start. It wouldn't be the first time we've been stranded without transportation, but at 10:30 on a Sunday night in the middle of nowhere it's not exactly an adventure that I wanted to go on. Thankfully, the 1992 Forerunner proved to be the modern marvel that it is and she started right up. The girls jumped in and were passed out before we pulled out of the lot. Josh dropped me back at the Grafton Inn where I slept like a rock after the Red Bull wore off.

The next morning Amanda and I were treated to an awesome country breakfast complete with pure VT maple syrup from right down the street...highlight of the trip. We hung around the next day and drove to a couple of covered bridges and checked out Rudyard Kipling's house (did you know he was a 4:30 miler? At least that's what Cassidy said) to do a few New England things before heading home.

It was great to get to spend a few days up in Vermont with Josh. It's like hitting the reset button on my soul when I go up there. I can't wait to get back up in the summer. I know New England has been pounded with snow this year, but some times I really miss it.

Here's what the looked like on Strava: