NYC Half 2013 race report

Another runner while waiting for the start joked "Why did we think it was a good idea to stand in the cold?"

"This is my third year in a row," I responded.  "You'd think I'd have learned by now."

It was five minutes yet until the race started but we had been in our corrals for at least 25 minutes.  Sunrise technically happened though offered no radiant heat solution to 30 degree temperatures that supposedly felt like twenty-two.  Shivers ran up and down the masses much like a herd of cattle swatting their tails.  I had, at least, worn two leaf-size plastic bags this year -- one as a sleeveless shirt and one as a skirt that covered my feet.  I was shivering too, but this year I didn't start out with frozen feet.  I also had timed my arrival as perfectly as public transit can allow, seamlessly exiting the train and entering my corral in the nick of time before they closed at 7:00 a.m., minimizing my wait in the cold.  I jumped straight into a bathroom line (a dozen latrines flanked every corral), which gave me a pre-performance-pee at 7:21.  Re-tied my shoes after the national anthem, and ditched the plastic outerwear just as the gun went off before my corral was able to move.

That whole lineup kicked off what I feel was a tactically successful day.  The NYC Half was its own race with the possibility of besting my half marathon time, but it was also my tune-up race for next month's Boston Marathon.  Usually I run for fun in the winter, see where I happen to fall during my first half marathon of the year, and increase from there.   This was the first time I trained with intent for a longer race amid the cold and occasional snow, and with the biggest unknown of how much working full time was going to affect my performance.  There was a lot riding on this race to validate or defunct the last 3 months of training.

The course was the same as last year.  Start on the Central Park loop at west 64th Street, just over one counter clockwise loop, exit the part onto 7th Ave, head south to Times Square, west on 42nd Street, south on the West Side Highway, and a small jaunt around the tip of Battery Park to finish by the South Street Seaport.

About a half hour in, my stomach developed a small, dull ache that could go one of two ways.  It could be muscular and related to a tight hip flexor, in which case it was spreading to my rectus abdominis (which has happened a while back in a few long runs).  It could also be visceral and my actual stomach cramping with associated referred pain much like it did in Virgil Crest.  Either result means having to stop and walk it off for a good while if it becomes full fledged.  Without knowing what would help, I took a salt pill.  Two minutes later it subsided.  I took my other salt pill at 60 minutes, in some ways hoping to dampen my upcoming mega-blast gel meant to speed my finish as well as keep my hamstrings happy (I still take certain precautions since Traprock last year).  Thankfully, no other cramps of any sort in any body part.

It was also the first time I have genuinely performed a negative split, where your pace increases steadily throughout a race and you finish faster than you start.  My pace splits:

   0k-5k:      6:58/mi
   5k-10k:    6:57/mi
   10k-15k:  6:47/mi
   15k-20k:  6:45/mi
   20k-21k:  6:23/mi

By half way I knew I could beat last year's time if I dealt my cards correctly.  It wasn't a desperate attempt to stumble forward with enough momentum, more just keeping the same faster tempo.  It helps when you know the race will be over so much more quickly than your usual weekend long runs.  It was definitely a lot of work -- despite 32 degree temps at the finish I still reduced my clothing to a mere tee shirt with bare arms and gloves, and even then I was still sweating through everything.  But when we crossed the finish like I felt like I could have kept going.  I wasn't seizing in my hips or using a massive arm pump to make up for deficits in fatigue.

I also had a really neat experience this year.  At about six miles in, a guy caught up to me and fall into pace at my side.  Remember all those times I wax poetic about the handful of fellow runners on the Henry Hudson Drive in the Palisades on Sunday mornings?  Raymond is one of them.  We exchanged formal introductions and realized we were striving for the same goal of beating 1:30.  We were together through Times Square, then I let him pull away slightly while cruising through much of the West Side Highway.   He never got more than 30 feet in front.  By the last mile and a half I caught back up, and I managed to surge ahead to the finish -- though this doesn't mean much, because he started in the corral behind me and had an actual finish time 45 seconds faster than mine.  But I got to run more than half the race with one of the people I so enjoy exchanging friendly hellos with each weekend.  When you don't belong to a running club and most of your friends don't run (or they just don't want to run with you for a variety of reasons), that is an incredibly nice feeling.  Who'd have thought?

In the end I managed to best last year's time by about 30 seconds:  1:29:25 (overall average pace: 6:50/mi), 96th female (out of 7,597), 599th overall (out of 14,500).

Now I feel ready for Boston.

Beacon loop day hike: Casino, Scofield, and Fishkill

We're busting out of the seams to leave NYC.  I get temporary relief from my weekends in the Palisades as weather allows, but Nathan isn't up to those distances anymore after a prolonged time off of running.  So when he found a last minute car rental for $44 per day, we jumped at the chance.

Originally we decided to shoot big - Slide Mountain in the Catskills, though compromising with our route when accounting for winter ice flows in place of hand-over-foot rock ledges.  Definitely did not want to duplicate what we almost got ourselves into last year on Sugarloaf.  We'd take the less aggressive route, and this year we were armed with Microspikes and headlamp and extra down poofy jackets and mega-insulated mittens and....  We'd pick up the car at 8am, get on the trail by 10:30 after driving straight there, and probably be off by about 4pm.

Checking weather the night before made us reconsider.  Wintery mix to start around noon, predictions of 1-4 inches in the towns, unknown how much intensified it would be in exposed areas along the ridge.  Determined to not be completely stupid yet not lose the day, we opted for Beacon, NY.  Just over an hour away, with a deli next to the trail head and the food/pharmacy/shelter of town a 2 minute drive or 5 minute walk away, my familiarity with the area, and actually having the map (kind of an important one in winter, right?).  We'd hopefully be starting our hike at 9:30 and finished by 1:30, with time remaining to hit up antique stores in Beacon and Cold Spring.

Our departure went without a hitch, and with the cold and predicted weather - not that bad, but people here are very, well, sensitive to the slightest hint of inclemency - we had no traffic issues as though it were an early Sunday morning.  We left the car and started at our predicted time, heading up the red Casino Trail as the snow started.  It is steep with a handful of switchbacks, having originated as ski slopes back in the day.  It runs overall in parallel to old, now mangled Mount Beacon Incline Railway that in its day climbed from 200 feet to 1500 feet of elevation to reach a casino (now just a brick set of walls) up on the ridge, hence the trail name.  It's worth it to follow that link and see the pictures of the angled rail cars and the grade of the climb.  In summers I usually would come from Breakneck Ridge to finish going down the Casino Trail, and it is steep enough that it is easier on the knees to jog than it is to hike down. 

Once on the vantage points along the route the wind and snow picked up.  I ended up most of the day in wool 200 weight long underwear quarter zip top and pants and my rain shell and winter hiking pants (kind of a light softshell of sorts), plus a wool beanie and Black Diamond Mercury Mitts since my hands are always the only part of me that does not handle the cold.  We snapped a few photos, but you are limited to few since stopping for more than one or two minutes resulted in a dramatic drop in core temperature.  Means I couldn't take enough time to get the exposure of our "view" to work out, but at least this time I remembered to use the darn thing and my hands would cooperate for at least a minute. 

The red Casino Trail passes close to the crest of South Beacon Mountain, which we skipped in lieu of staying warm for the moment in the temporary protection of a more wooded area.  It then bottoms out at the yellow Wilkinson Memorial trail along Scofield Ridge.  We headed north, and along a series of vantage points had to keep track rather well as to where the trail was supposed to be.  The rock outcroppings capping the ridge are great for summer lunches or naps, but with only bushes and no trees to place trail markings they end up painted onto the rock.  Once the rock is covered by snow, which by now accumulated to about 2 inches with bits of ice beneath, then it gets tricky.  A few are straight forward with large breaks in the bush leading forth.  Others, particularly larger outcroppings, were not so clear what with about 50 feet of open nothingness and a dozen possible trail starts on the other side.  One of us would keep tabs on our last marker, the other would attempt to guess a line according to the map.  The snow at that point was sideways and making the left side of my mouth numb.  Had we not found it within fifteen minutes then we would have opted to turn around and head back along where we knew was marked, even if it meant being out for longer than predicted.

The yellow Wilkinson trail made a few zigs and zags before hitting a short connecting blue trail.  Blue is not the easiest to see on dark tree trunks in winter, but aside from scanning the environment a few times it was easy to follow.  Maybe ten minutes on the blue trail and we found the white Fishkill Ridge.  Blue may be been a little hard to see at times, but white, as you can imagine, was all the more fun.  Many points here had snow four inches deep.  We made our way to the top of Lamb's Hill to another vantage point and outcropping.  This one took a good ten minutes to find on the other side, largely because the trees did not start for a good ways down the other side.  This one made me happy I had an extra wool sweater, vest and down sweater in my pack just in case.  Didn't pull them out, its those moments that hint at the worth of the gear you have or, in some instances, do not have (*cough*cough*Sugarloaf*cough*).

The day continued to be either uphill or downhill.  Rarely was there much in between.  Did I mention how great Microspikes are?  Best.  Invention.  Ever.  We wish we had stock.  Heading down from Lamb's Hill we found a few spots with ice beneath the snow.  Usually we'd stick, even if after a one-inch slide.  At one point Nathan was leading.  He stopped, turned to point out another iffy patch, and barely had he turned forward when his feet went out and he gracefully swept onto his right side.  I started laughing, my usual response to myself or others falling.  Aren't I a great and compassionate wife?  But he kept sliding down, rolling onto his back and then his left while sliding backward, nothing within reach to grab.

A six inch diameter tree was the only thing between him and continuing his slide down off the side of the ridge for who knows how far.  It caught him at the butt, with a good posterior jolt to the trunk and legs.  Once he hit the tree I got serious again, took one step towards him, and before I knew it I too was whisked onto my butt and accelerating downhill with spiked feet headed straight towards Nathan.  I couldn't turn or stop or reorient myself.  Only thing I could muster was to slide with my feet apart in the splits so that the spikes wouldn't kill my new husband who had managed to not go flying off the edge of a ridge.  Apparently I looked like quite the cartoon headed spread eagle towards him.  Nathan may be skinny, but thankfully he isn't fragile.  Otherwise my butt would have crushed his ribs.  Not much else would have saved our fifteen foot slide except full crampons and an ice ax.

Once stopped I was able to roll onto my belly and maintain enough traction to untangle my leg from Nathan's armpit, though I was laughing so hard that I was about to pee myself.  (Even now as I write this, I've been in tears from laughing so hard for the last ten minutes.  The kittens have no idea what to make of me.)  Nathan was concerned for the reality of the little tree and what otherwise would have been a very precarious situation.  Me?  My concern was getting off the iceflow and onto tractionable ground so that I could relieve myself volitionally and tell this story while retaining a milligram of dignity.  Even once safely peeing I was crying from laughing so hard.

The visible track of ice down the trail was the full path we slid.  The tree just to the left of middle was what saved us.

A better view of how much further we may have fallen, with the trail and our locale of fall/catch obscured here by the trees in the panel second from the right.

Regrouped, we made our way along the rest of the white and picked up the small yellow connecting trail that led back to the car.  Mid-yellow was tricky when crossing a forest road.  The tree that had two markers indicating the direction of a turn had been split between the two markers.  One marker was on the remaining stump, the other was twenty feet away on the top half of the tree laying sideways across its neighbors.  For those marking trails, this is where having one or two immediately following the turn is a good thing to confirm the trail and back up your original mark.  Took another ten minutes for this one.

Regrouping from the fall.  (Actually, he just wanted his picture taken sitting on the little bridge.  We were in good spirits.)

Somewhere along the white trail, post-slide.

Just before reconnecting with the base of the original red Casino trail we encountered a woman out hiking on her own.  She wore hiking boots, but she was really slow going on comparatively flat ground.  Another score for our improvement over last year.  By the time we made it back to the rental car we totaled three and a half hours.  The snow and sleet had in the last hour turned to freezing rain and bits of actual rain, so we were happy with our timing.  A little reorganizing while the car warmed up, and into town we went.

Turned out that most places were closed.  Not sure how many of them may be closed on Mondays anyways, but it seemed that many places either stayed closed or closed early due to "inclement" weather.  On the sidewalks and streets everything seemed fine to us, and for the rest of the day we didn't encounter anything hairy, but so goes the NYC-sprawl's reaction to weather.  We managed to find a place with a veggie burger, but no antique stores were open.  We found one that would have been awesome, and through the window saw two old wooden tool boxes that would have been great to organize some of Nathan's fountain pens and smaller items.  Next time, I suppose.

We still hit up Cold Spring, only a few towns away.  Closed, closed, and more closed.  We couldn't think of anything else for which to use the car, so opted to call it a day and return home.  The drive back was wet but not icy, though from the way others were driving you'd have though otherwise.  We were surprised at how empty things felt at 4:30pm, which is usually when rush hour is developing well.  Meant that the whole way home was as eventless as the drive up pre-snow/wintery mix. 

In all, our time on the trail amounted to around 7.5 miles with more than a few thousand feet of cumulative gain, and our time getting to/from the rental agency and through the town of Beacon amounted to another 6.5 miles.  Our route ended up being just a hair different than the suggested South Mount Beacon/Scofield Ridge, the only difference being that we skipped the little crest of South Mount Beacon.  Having all the right gear makes for all the difference between arriving home satisfied with your day and arriving home thankful to be alive. 

January update

January was, as always, an iffy month.  Fluctuating winter doldrums from missing my Sunday mornings on the trails and waking up to continued darkness each morning.  Slacking mental capacities thanks to years of scholastic winter breaks conditioning me to be a meat head for a month.  Heavy caseloads at work, where each time I sit to write notes during lunch or at the end of the day I end up staring at the screen for ten minutes while my body's alternator tries to jump start my brain.  (Insert co-workers: "Staring at it won't make it come easier."  Also, orthopedic and other scheduled surgeries come to a lull depending on time of year and various holidays.  Oncology units, on the other hand, never take breaks, especially non-surgical and thus more medically acute patients.  And with their fluctuating mental status and needs for assistance x2 people for basic mobility, your days become filled with lots of and lots of squats.  When you lay in bed and try to get comfortable - that is when you find out if you had good body mechanics or not.) 

Between those moments were, thankfully, plenty of anti-January things.

Getting the ever present kitteh things out of the way, Merus's last visit to the vet that yielded more extractions has been an absolute dream ever since.  I pushed for an x-ray, and we finally found the root of the problem (pun not intended).  She is now just over 3 weeks post-op, meaning the long acting pain shot has worn off and we are now left with the evidence of whether it worked or not - and it has.  She yawns with her mouth wide open instead of stifled half way, she has no qualms over food textures, she and her sister get along as siblings should (snuggling at times and an even distribution of who initiates play fights).

The teeth:

 
Nathan now calls her Snaggle Tooth.  

And at some point this happened:

Sadie has taken to jumping to the tops of doors:

 
Bad Cat is in bad need of a cat jungle gym, but we're not going to pay for something like that, especially when it would take up half of our measly living room.  We've had the fortune of watching her miss a few times.  At this point I no longer help her down in hopes that she realizes the predicament she creates.  (I am pretending that cats have object permanence and that Sadie actually has a conscience.  Highly unlikely, but whatever.)

Moving along, I got a haircut.  The only picture I have at this point is from my phone, hence the blur:

The first three episodes of Northern Exposure came through Nathan's store, so he snatched them up.  Always nice to have non-cat entertainment in the evenings to make us feel more like normal people and less like crazy cat people.

We've discovered Rummikub thanks to Molly and Brian, who joined us for Christmas Eve dinner and have had us over a few times now for game nights mixed with football nights.  Brian is also a Patriots fan, so we're going to play more Rummikub while watching the Superbowl since all our teams and our backup teams are done. 

While I've been stuck on the roads for a while on my Sunday runs, the cold temperatures (especially this last week) mean the few others I encounter along the way are out there for similar reasons.  It's so nice to exchange genuine smiles and greetings with others in the community.  That's part of what makes the Palisades so dear to my heart.

Nathan also came across a slew of cds at work.  The most notable has been Tom Lehrer.  I didn't know what to make of him at first, but then I learned he taught mathematics and we heard his more nerdy and/or politically sly songs.  Here are two nerdy gems that are also re-posted by others on YouTube:

Lastly, we took the opportunity yesterday to go on a winter day hike.  A forecast of mixed precipitation meant downgrading from the Catskills to the Hudson Highlands, though we still had a wonderful time.  Even with a double slide out.  That story, though, will be for another post coming shortly.

Two trashed hamstrings, one alien toenail baby, one blood blister, icicles for eyelashes, graspless hands, and 17.5 miles later - Manhattan Half race report

Update 1/28:  Placing my bib on my upper thigh made sense when prepping for the run, but it turns out that I selected the wrong thigh.  The photographers all stood on the opposite side of the route.  So no mid-run goodness.  But, there is at least a shot of me having just passed the finish line.  

Bottom left: purple shirt, blue hat, and big smile on my face.

The Manhattan Half was downgraded from a race to a fun run this year thanks to NYC's first real snow of the season.  Meaning no one is officially timed, no corrals are used for the start, no pressure to run.  On that last point, everyone who registered for the race gets credit regardless of whether or not they participated.  Similarly, you can run as much or as little of the race-now-run as you'd like.  All aid stations and ambulance posts would remain, and a few police automobiles made sweeps to assure no one was stuck without help if needed. 

In this week's lead-up, a handful of people registered for the race through Team In Training came into my current PT clinic (a very runner/triathlon/active person oriented orthopedic clinic) for overuse injuries wrought from training.  The hot topic was always weather predictions.  Wednesday predicted a 5:00 a.m. low of 27 degrees, an afternoon high of 36 degrees, and a 70% chance of "wintery mix" as yet unspecified as to time of descent.  As one might guess from my previous Catskills ice rehash blog, the presence of ice of any sort would preclude my participation.  I've had enough history with my knees and would prefer to not add ACL rupture into the mix, thank you very much.  Somehow didn't occur to me at the time that the race might be canceled if it were that bad.

The end result became 3-5 inches of snow and only snow through 10:00 a.m., after which a light freezing rain would progress to the aforedetested wintery mix.  [Yes, I proudly made that up, red dotted underscore be damned.]  Since my anticipated slower race time would still beat the ick, I opted turn it into a normal long run so that after crossing the finish I'd simply continue running the 4.5 miles home.

Turned out perfect.  Here's a Flickr photo of the start I found via search (with full credit to the photo's owner, 52 Projects).  Running in the snow is wonderfully exhausting.  The wind was something of 10 mph from the north, for which the two jaunt's heading north along the east half of the main Central Park loop resulted in icicles along my eyelashes despite the ball cap.  Others wearing beanies had full-faced icing reminiscent of a white haired Groucho Marx if half his eyebrows fell onto his lashes.  I was able to melt them pretty quickly by holding the back of my gloved thumb across my eye for a few seconds.

By the second lap the pre-race "attempt" to plow a path was filling in and becoming sloppy, as expected.  Central Park's small hills became much more tedious for my hamstrings.  Amazingly I only had one partial second of sliding that was more a glitch than a potential fall.  The snow and only snow proved to allow my trail shoes ample purchase regardless of how thick or thin the ground coverage.  I remembered that these shoes, the Brooks Cascadia 5, were a little stiff for my liking on the trail, but I forgot how much they tear up my feet for longer runs.  This I also felt during second lap, though only mildly.

By the start of the south end's 1 mile mini-loop toward the finish line on the 72nd street traverse, race directors stood along the sides with megaphones saying everyone should head to the finish line regardless of what loop you were on.  Apparently the northern portion, like Harlem Hill, was getting precarious and they did not want slower runners to continue.  The state of my hamstrings led to consideration of taking the subway home, but the thought of no longer running and thus cooling off quickly in the 15 degree wind chill did not sound appealing.  I figured I'd run north through the park, where I at least knew the state of the roads, and hop out and onto a train if and when necessary.

By the time I got to 96th street I realized that the uphills were the killing factor for my hammies.  I left the park at 100th street to avoid a third bout of Harlem Hill and found the Central Park West sidewalks to be runnable so continued on.  The wintery mix had started, but it was rather light with a good base of snow, so I figured I'd make Iowa proud and just keep heading home.  Who needs to take the subway for a mere 2 miles when you're already running in the same direction anyways?  (Don't answer that....)

Once a half mile from home alongside City College, I was atop the hill that is Hamilton Heights/West Harlem and feeling the respective wind.  My hands were not burning thanks to a recent running mitten purchase, but I still had no ability to form any grasp necessary to zip my jacket.  A man happened to be entering the college with a toddler, and he nicely helped me get my jacket zipper started despite my having creeped him out with such a request.

Once home I was exhausted though pleasantly smug that I had no falls and no injuries.  Definitely the most effortful long run I've had since the marathon in November.  I removed my shoes and socks only to find a nice blood blister on the inside of my left big toe mound.  Sweet.  My year and a half old alien toenail baby throbbed.  Rockin'.  At least the latter never hurts while receiving shoe trauma, only after.  Add a hot shower, kittehs holding down my legs and hot drinks.  Cue supremo satisfaction.

You know you're jealous of my fancy pants.

The math for my average pace during the half marathon as compared to the hamstring rehash slog home is quite telling.  Race average: 7:52 per mile.  Slog home: 9:22 per mile.  Oddly enough, I was relieved to be home and yet realized I could continue further had I needed.  Preferably with a change of shoes, but that is none the matter.   Wait, what's the proper syntax for "none the matter"?  Whatever.  I'm too pooped care right now.

If any photos from NYRR's usual race documenting crew turn out then I'll update this entry and post them here.  Taking bets on how red my face is from being pelted with snow.  I'm guessing no less than magenta.

Closing in on 1000

According to Blogger metrics, as of 1:45 p.m. today I am at 987 views in total for this blog.  Pretty soon I will hit 1000 views -- and yet ZERO comments!

Come on, people.  Get excited!  Do I really need to finish each entry with "So what is your opinion?  What do you think about blah-de-blah-blah?"  I assumed that since comments are available to give then it was understood that comments are welcome and desired, but perhaps I assumed too much.  A note to those who are less familiar with the Blogger-sphere: you do not have to use your name when leaving comments if you so wish (e.g. I could use Bucky instead of my real name), and the email it requests for response sake does is not posted (only the administrator -- me -- sees your email).

I have said my part.  Moving on...

According to Weather.com today for uptown NYC:

6:30 a.m. (waking up):  16 degrees, wind chill 0 degrees.
9:15 a.m. (start of my run):  17 degrees, wind chill 1 degree.
11:45 a.m. (after my run):  19 degrees, wind chill 6 degrees.

Winter has finally (!!) arrived.

I've been running consistently for the last two years.  For two or three yeas prior to that I stopped running, for both my mind and my knee's sake, and I always felt like I somehow missed winter.  I commuted through the cold and muck each day unless limited by ankle deep snow, but it wasn't the same.  The magic little bubble you create around yourself, the cold air in your lungs, the quiet on the roads and the calm shared by you and the few other winter participants you come across....  It is wonderful.  Give me black ice and I am, admittedly, swearing up a storm and cursing the world, but that is unique to ice and just coincidentally occurs during winter.  Anyways, it was nice.

I went through my photos from 2011 and pulled out the small handful for which I particularly like the results, regardless of whether I tried for those results or whether I just got lucky.  One photo is reposted from before.  The pool of photos was smaller than I wish, a factor of the attention required by school mixed with the decreasing interest for the city.  I'm looking forward to the rest of this winter and spring for the transitions that will take place and, hopefully, for the reclamation of such hobbies.

The Raymond Naftali Center (Chelsea, NYC, 2011)

Heather and baby Sid (Morningside Heights, NYC, 2011)

Cowgirl Alex (Austin, TX, 2011)

Potted plants (Kansas City, MO, 2011)

Sugarloaf Mtn day hike.

Last Sunday was spent day hiking in the Catskills.  John was able to borrow a friend's car, Nathan had the day off from work (hark!), it was my last day before starting affiliation 3 -- 'twas set to be a magnificent day spent outdoors on rock stairwells going up and down and up and down.  Just my kind of time away.

We had a three hour car ride to ponder the day.  With about an hour to go John crooned that we could expect "thirty degrees and not a cloud in the sky."  Hmm.  My assessments before packing made it look like a 40 degree day, which is much different.  My pack held a ball cap and a beanie, down sweater, agile gloves, wool long underwear, extra socks, lunch, a full 2-liter Camelbak, my point and shoot digital camera, headlamp with working batteries, toiletry back-ups and necessary wallet items.  I thought about this a little longer, realizing I was already a little chilled in the car.  Cue wool long johns added to my person.  (Learning to change quickly and efficiently in the backseat of a car in high school through all the sports/dance/activity changes still comes in quite handy.)  As we rolled into the park area and wound through the roads to our trail head the temperature dropped another ten degrees.  Add beanie and gloves, prep bag so that we can get moving fast to build body heat.

After about ten minutes the trail finally starts climbing for real, fingers are still a bit cold but my circulation is building.  We came across an overlook where slate pieces were stacked into a structures such as a stairwell (to where we could not tell) and a "room" with multiple chairs.  You can see it in the YouTube video.  Not too much longer we hear cracking ice as we near a pond.  I slowed thinking it was a large animal on the other side of the pond dipping a paw or hoof repeatedly.  Turned out to be the ice cracking from the sun.  A beaver presence was nonetheless heavily present.  John noted the craftsmanship and resulting texture of the wood from the beavers' work, handing Nathan a long stick as an example. 

A frozen beaver pond, and Nathan's new stick friend.

Pretty sure these beavers are better organized that many humans could ever be.

Nathan and the stick became fast friends, so much so that he brought it with for the rest of the hike.  Reminded me of my brother Sam when he was a little tyke.  If he was into a new toy he'd end up cradling in his sleep for half the week. 

From there the trail curved around the lake and led upwards.  Small bits of ice were evident between rocks here and there, but nothing seemed all that significant.  I may have grown up in Missouri's ice filled winters and attended undergrad at Iowa (which, admittedly, is more powder than ice), but I sure as hell do *not* get along with ice.  Get that?  That's N-O-T.  At all.  I am on fall precautions around ice, quadruply so if its black ice.  I made a joke referring to this to explain my odd trajectory choices to John, and Nathan proclaimed he never worries about ice after growing up in the Syracuse area.

And then the comedic gods aligned.

*Slip*shuffle*boom*, Nathan was on his butt.  I had the pleasure of witnessing the entire event without a blink.  Legs slipped forward and to the right, landing semi-mermaid on the outside of his left thigh after bonking a knee on the way down.  But the stick?  Held aloft so that it never hit the ground.  "Don't worry, guys, the stick is okay."

Nathan used the stick the entire time, alternating between a substitute for Stretch Armstrong arms and taking it for a walk like the habit of many a cane user.  (Insert finger wag for those who know they should use their assistive device properly but do not.)  John and I preferred bilateral hand grabs on the trees and rocks.  The vertical had become quite fun, more a hand-over-foot stairwell.  We were gaining elevation fast, and yet so was the amount of ice around us.  There's one shot in the video of where the ice was enough that I pulled out the camera.  After that it continued to thicken into solid ice around us, though with plenty of rocks or brush sticking out for foot holds.  The temperature felt like it was dropping, and using my hands on so many cold boulders took them from chilly to cold to burning very quickly.

I don't know if the true peak was marked or if it was on a slightly different route, but we did pass a sign once things flattened out that was quite satisfying (for an east coaster with proximity issues, that is):

Atop Sugarloaf Mountain.

And at 3500 feet, this was the view of the neighboring hills:

Scenic view from 3500 feet.

The temperature dropped further, in part from the elevation but in part due to quick-collecting cloud cover.  We saw one or two snow flakes, wondered if it was from the air dealing with moisture content more than true precipitation.  The ice underfoot, however, became a steady path that swathed the entire trail.  The surrounding vegetation was thick enough that we could not move through anywhere aside from the trail, so we forced ourselves through pine branches and sought whatever bits of snow may have existed atop the ice.  I think we covered a half mile in thirty minutes to get to our intended scenic view on the other side of Sugarloaf.  My hands were on fire from the cold.  I stopped and pulled out the down sweater.  It's hard enough to hike with your hands tucked into your pockets, let alone when you are on fall precaution and atop a lobular, multi-inch thick ice slab.

Here's where the "Aha!" moment struck.  Multiple warm days into the 50s and 60s, lots of melting, followed by 24 hours that went sub-freezing.  Ooooh, right, it is January and we are winter hiking.  Another blonde moment of genius added to the list.  But to my credit, all three of us were fooled by the previous week to a certain degree -- no Microspikes, no emergency blankets, only one stove between us (John's), only two headlamps between us (John's and mine), no extra warm descent mittens. 

And then that damn stick.  Nathan would wait for me to catch up, as I had transformed from the quickest to the weakest link, then walk behind me for a bit, probably assessing for mental changes.  Then I'd see the stick sliding along the ice, creeping past me from behind.  If Nathan were to have fallen again, he'd need a twelve foot radius for that damn stick.  So having it pull a classless pass -- think those who call "LEFT!" on a public track for no other reason than to gloat over their speed -- made me even less at ease.  I told him to keep clear of me with that stick, so he'd shuffle and hop along the ice like it was nothing until he was out of sight (meaning about 40 feet ahead).

For those of you familiar with the swishy sound of synthetic outerwear when moving really fast, you may substitute this for the forthcoming onomatopoeia: *swish*swish*shweee*shploop*, then silence....  John: "You okay?"  Nathan: "Yea, I landed on my abdomen."  John: "How's the stick?"  Nathan: "It's fine.  I think I bruised my elbow..."  Kinda sad I missed seeing that one, but I was just fine with my slow and cautious pace.

The top of Sugarloaf is worn into a soft curve, much like the tops of nearby mountains you can see from the pictures.  Our route would make one big loop, and at this point we were traversing the top of Sugarloaf from a southern-ish to northern-ish exposure, simultaneously doubling the amount of ice and adding a strong, cold wind and some flurries to the equation.  Just when I was about to get despondent we found the teenie path to the overlook marking the midway point of our route. 

From the halfway point across the top of Sugarloaf Mtn., >3500 feet.

The wind removed most niceties about the view.  Not quite enough pine in the right growth pattern to make a wall against the wind unless you were small enough, i.e. the size of a little terrier, to squeeze through the inner forest.  John make quick tea so we'd have something warm to drink while we ate.  I wasn't even hungry, but if I was going to stay warm then adding calories would be pinnacle.  It would only take one more shift towards true winter conditions for our fun day hike to turn into straight up survival mode.  I also added my second layer of socks, tucked in my shirts, and marched in place until we were able to get moving.

We picked up the main trail and continued to crawl along the route as planned.  Temperature dropped more, wind picked up more.  Eventually we struck a natural boulder stairwell where the trail starts a long and steep descent.  Aside from the large boulder obstructing our view beyond the first drop-off, it was ice about a foot thick with few trees to assist us.  In the forest to each side offered a similar drop-off with ice layered atop the snow.  Nathan thinks we can make it down.  I think it is imminent death since we are without crampons and ropes.  Cue muttering about the damn stick and cavalier invincibility.  John pulls out the map to see if distance is a factor at this point.  We had to factor in the remaining daylight, which was just enough to backtrack our ascent route but only if we left immediately.  My mind was now in full on survival mode -- I am going to be at my clinic at 6:45 a.m. come hell or high water, f***ers.  I hurled myself to the other side of the trail to get a view beyond the first boulder, and I saw at least 30 feet of an ice climbing route in place of the trail.  No way in hell.  I called made the executive decision, and if my voice didn't somehow convey it then my face surely did.

The hike back across the top of Sugarloaf to the southern-ish exposure was pretty much like the first pass, though we crawled at perhaps .1mph faster since we were more determined.  The little elevation changes were down this time, so the trees became our friends while we got onto our butts to ease and/or slide our way down various passes.  It all looked incredibly different from this direction, so we didn't remember what obstacles we'd have to tackle in reverse -- though we knew everything was guaranteed to be better than that potential reverse ice climb sans tools.  Nathan still -- still! -- used his stick while grabbing trees with the other hand.  My hands finally stopped burning since they got to participate for an hour on mostly trees rather than cold rock.

I did not realize I had no photo or video documentation of the Sugarloaf ice flows until we made it back to the true descent.  What passed as tricky before was now downgraded to a pretty decoration, and only then did my camera even occur to me.  Probably better off that way, lest I'd have dropped it down the ice flow of doom due to painfully frozen and clumsy hands.  We were now out of the wind and into "warmer" temperatures, and we estimated that matching our ascension pace would give a 15 minute leeway before it was dark.  Off we went.  I was in a much better mood and no longer fearing for my life.  Nathan let us talk about things other than the stick, though we still teased him about it.

When we got back to the beaver pond, it looked like true winter returned while we were nearly getting stuck atop a mountain. 

Beaver pond, late afternoon. 

We passed the slate cliff-side modular hang out and were nearly back to the car when we spotted a gnome, face pointing towards Sugarloaf, body en route with the trail towards the car.  It was not there on the hike in.  A local may have a sense of humor, but really I think he's smiling that we didn't get our asses handed to us in a self-induced emergency situation.  Plus, the slightly underprepared blonde on fall precautions did not, in fact, have any fall or any threat of a fall.  So there.

Mr. Gnome.

We made it to the car with no problems.  After the few minutes needed to pack up and roll out we already needed headlights.  Luuuucky....

I left out the video I took of Nathan putting the stick into the car to bring home, largely because you couldn't tell the significance of the stick unless you heard the story.  And the only video of the way down was a small shot from when I noted my hands had warmed up again and I no longer felt like death was imminent.  John's reaction had been "This?  You're videoing this???"  Quite the understatement.