Mountain Llama: Winter Came and Went

What happened to winter?! I'm mourning it already. Unfortunately, this winter got a late start and an early exit. Of course when I'm finally loving winter again. But it was still pretty awesome getting into backcountry skiing. Not enough to really get good at it, but I'd say I'm much better. Next year will be the year of improvement. I'm still hitting up King Pine for workout laps, but their snow will be gone before we know it, too. Just hoping it holds out for the Wild Corn Shindig in 1.5 weeks. We signed up for it. I'm a little hesitant to be doing this skimo race in front of a crowd since my skiing sucks, but maybe I'll provide some entertainment as Jerry of the Day. Haha! Definitely going to send it over the jump a la... My Jerry Aspiration

Apparently you're supposed to wear a costume, too, but why bring more attention to myself... unless everyone else is in costume but me... then I'm bringing attention to myself. I'll come prepared with something, even if it's just a Hawaiian print dress I can wear with shorts underneath. I don't fit in, but I don't want to stand out either way. Haha.

My posts are getting few and far between since it's just the same ole, same ole to write about, but I do have some stuff to share, along with way too many photos. After having two straight weeks of getting our asses handed to us at work, we've ventured into a quieter two weeks so I'm kind of bored right now. Figured I could update the blog. I'll be honest that this break after two weeks of hell has been nice. Two Mondays ago, I took half a day off from Action to go work the Vaccine Super Site as a vaccinator. I was up before 4am for that. As soon as I walked in the door at Action, we got the first transfer of the day and literally were out straight for 13 hours. Omg. It was brutal. The Wednesday before that, Jeff and I did 8 911 calls out of Tamworth. It just wouldn't stop.

Ryan is still burning up old vacation time on Wednesdays so his messages from his adventures keep me entertained all day. He's currently up in the Bowl with Gabe doing some skiing. He's so happy being able to get out there on the skis so much this winter, especially since he hasn't been able to run. He sent me this photo a few hours ago. How much happier could one look than this?

Doing the Vaccine Super Site was pretty cool. I got there early and teamed up with two women who would be my awesome support crew for the shift. We had a system down just banging them out. Boom, boom done. I was lucky to have these two since we were the most efficient in our lane. I didn't have to do anything, but tell the patients to put their cars in park, hand me identification and then administer the shot. The team did the rest. The whole system was amazing. Worked great. It was a long morning on my feet in the cold, but cool to be a part of. My team also liked working with me so much that they tracked me down via LinkedIn to ask if I could be their vaccinator again for this weekend's Super Site. Unfortunately, I'm already working over 70 hours this week so I didn't want to add more on. Maybe the next one, though.

My vaccine table. I was there under Conway Fire & Rescue's employment.

My amazing team, Eileen and Heather... (We moved to a table in the sun after I took this photo.)

Despite the short winter for my skiing, I still managed to get out a bit more. My favorite day was the Wildcat Valley Ski Trail. We started off the day with skate skiing at Jackson XC where we split up so Ryan could get some training in for the Tuckerman Inferno while I worked on technique. I didn't feel like I was doing any better today, much like Waterville Valley. I was using a new set of skate skis which turned out to be my biggest problem! I went back to my old skis and did fine! I'm not fast and really need to work on technique, but I can at least do it now. After we met back up at the car, we decided to change plans from Black Mt to ski up to Wildcat D on the XC trail since we already had trail passes. This was one of my favorite afternoons, and the skiing was SO fun. Perfect conditions and a good grade on the way down for my skill level made it super fun. I so wished we had more days like this, but unfortunately, we never did.

Soooo dreamy... Haha

John turned 15 in February! That was pretty exciting. I picked him up from school to take him to Black Mt to ski for a couple of hours then got take-out from Hobbs. I got him the best cake ever at Whole Foods in Portland. Omg. So worth the money. We did the whole birthday candle thing after dinner. Pretty low-key birthday as usual. I still can't believe I have a 15 year old, though! Where did the time go?!

One of his birthday presents from me...

I took a day off from the Covid testing the day after John's birthday. The first time I'd taken off from there since we started the testing center in July. The only other week I had off was the week of Christmas. The other two Fridays I wasn't there, I just traded for different days during the week. I'm only there one day a week, but even I'm burned out with it. I SO needed this day off. I haven't taken a day off from work in over a year and no vacation days for 1.5 years. And these 10+hour days are awful. Everyone who works in the "cottage" is burned out with it. I'm hoping Friday hours are reduced soon or I might not make it much longer. Our numbers per day have dwindled down to 1/3 of what we were doing, yet we're still stuck there for almost 11 hours total. So many gaps with appointments not filled are making us lose our minds with boredom. I really want some of my Friday back. Luckily, I have an awesome guy who surprised me with whoopie pies and flowers when I got home from a long Friday shift. He even put candles in the whoopie pies for no reason. I love him.

Ryan took this same Friday off, too, so we decided to do a run up Mt Pierce and then skate ski at Bretton Woods after. This would be a test run for Ryan's hip injury. It was not a great outcome since it was still hurting when we finished, but the run up was nice. And a super gorgeous day, too! Trail conditions started of great then quickly turned to soft snow so the run up wasn't easy but worth it just to get up there.

At Bretton Woods, I had the same issue with not being able to skate ski well at all, and that's when I realized it HAD to be the new skis. Sure enough, it was. Just wished I had realized it sooner. I still got in some decent miles on the flat stuff while Ryan did another training workout.

Work and poor ski conditions cut our Friday Night Dates out, but we still got a few more times for some xc skiing. Took the dogs on a fun 5 mile loop on the Oliverian-Downes Ski Trail off the Kanc. The ski was perfect in heavy falling snow... which turned to rain only a few hours later.

We also took the dogs for a spin on the xc ski trails in N Sandwich which was also fun. Kicking myself for not remembering this trail sooner.

I attempted to skin up Hurricane Mt Rd withe dogs one day, but it was so warm and the snow so sticky that I could barely move. I had to push with my poles on the downhill. Haha. Next year, I'll be sure to hit it at a better time.

We had another failed attempt at xc skiing on the Nanamocomuck Ski Trail from Rocky Gorge. It was pure ice so we opted to just ski on Falls Pond there instead. It turned out to be really fun with the dogs and much warmer in the sun. Not what we came for but way more fun than xc skiing on ice.

We got one more skate ski in together at Jackson XC before my skate ski season was over. Luckily, I was able to do a longer hilly loop since I switched back to my old skate skis. The conditions were pretty decent, and I actually enjoyed it again! My longest skate ski yet at just over 10 miles. I'm still stupidly slow, but we're buying season passes next year so I plan to get a lot better at it.

We spent a Sunday doing a hike up Mt Adams. Conditions were really good for it. We took a route less traveled and saw not a single person until we got up to the summit where these cute people insisted on taking photos of us. Haha. We obliged even though my exposed hand was frozen. Such a gorgeous hike. So pretty, it almost looks fake. Hiking this long was a bit foreign to us since we're used to running. We ended up SO sore in the quads from the hike down which I thought was funny. Definitely not in hiking shape. Ryan was still trying to let the hip heal up before the Tuckerman Inferno. He didn't want to go into it in any pain for the snowshoe run leg.

I've only been running 3 days a week and pretty low mileage since we were doing other things. I didn't mind it one bit, and I'm sure I'll do the same thing next year. I usually end up doing too much road running in the winter, and with it being so hard on my body now, I'm happy to finally have alternatives. I have put on a little weight with so little running, but my glutes have gotten so much stronger. The runs I have done are pretty solid pace-wise so now, I just need to get the distance fitness back once the trails melt out. I supposed I'm ready for it. I am a little out of mountain running shape, but I had a good run up Mt Chocorua a few weeks on the most perfect winter trails and the summit all to myself. You couldn't get any better than that.

Ryan and I got out for few more Wildcat laps, and I'm hoping for a few more before it's all said and done. The time change has allowed us to get up there for sunset now which was awesome our last time up there together.

I got one last lap on the Sherbie last Thursday. We got up there late and had the entire thing to ourselves. We had expected bad conditions due to the rain, but instead we were surprised by fresh powder snow. We even go first tracks on some of it. Haha. It didn't last long, though. The skiing went from quiet to that familiar sound of scraping ice those of us in Northeast are so used to hearing. Haha. Conditions were still pretty awesome, and what a difference since my first time on that trail. I'm still super slow but I cut my downhill time in half.... to 17 minutes. Hahaha. Laughable, but we did actually stop a lot, too, so it wasn't that bad... but still, yes, it's pretty fucking slow. Haha. I was just happy not to be nervous this time. It was really fun! I'll be going into next winter ready to get better.

Two weekends ago, we went back to Mt Abram for a skimo race put on by Baxter Outdoors and True Strength Athletics. A lot of really nice people there. This would be my first skimo race so I was a little nervous about the boot packing. I borrowed a pack from the RD but had no idea how to use it. I would end up losing so much time on that since I struggled. I also skipped the optional boot packs where the beer was because of the pack issues. You got 5 minutes off your time for each beer you drank so I was a little bummed out not to take part in the fun part of the race, but I will next year. The format was cool. You had 3 laps. You could choose one of two directions to start so I chose the one with less people and a less steeper grade since we had no time to warm up. You descended from the top via the same route each leg. The second lap had 2 mandatory boot packs so this is where I got way behind. Luckily, Jim Stevenson was right there with me and helped a little bit with the pack. My skis were knocking me in the head the whole time still so I struggled. I wasn't in skimo skis anyway so I wasn't really worried about finishing well overall. I was just there for the fun, even if I did get a little frustrated a few times. The third lap sent you up whichever side was the opposite of the person in front of you so I lucked out to get the side I hadn't yet done. I saw Jim Stevenson in the woods at the boot pack drinking a beer and so wanted to have one, too, but one look at the boot pack with this awful pack, and I was like no way. I was so excited when I got to the bottom to find out Ryan finished 2nd!! I was so happy for him to do well. He's such a strong skier. Uphill and downhill. He had been training as hard as he can for the Tuckerman Inferno so it really paid off today. He was really happy. Results

We drove down to Portland after the race for a late lunch and a beer at Bunker Brewing. When we got home, there were beers in my mailbox from one of my favorite Rhode Island breweries put there by my friend, Rachel, who is moving up this way soon. Thanks, Rachel!

The next day, we took John for one last ski at Black Mountain for the season. We did the lift thing, and I managed to fall TWICE getting off the lift. The first time was John's fault for sticking his pole in between my skis, but I had to own the second one. Haha. What a dork. I tried to get some photos, but they were too fast for me to get a good one. It was snowing heavily the whole time we were there which was weird because the conditions were so bad. Might have to give up on Black Mt for season tickets for the 2nd time. Haha.

After cramming in about 5-6 weeks of training, the Tuckerman Inferno finally arrived for Ryan. I was so excited for Ryan to do it and looked forward to crewing him even though there wasn't much for me to do. He worked really hard to get fit for it despite not being able to run and having a heavy fat bike. It was an early, cold morning. We got up there in the dark and dropped the skis off at the Pinkham transition then headed down to Great Glen Trails. We found his transition spot and brought his bike, skate skis and snowshoes down. Kevin Tilton was there doing a leg for his Inferno team. It was good to see him again. I knew a handful of the people on the teams but only a couple of the other solo racers. I thought there would be more locals doing it, but they didn't show up.

Each racer started 10 seconds apart. Ryan was number 34 and was around 5 minutes behind the first person. The first leg was the fat bike which would end up being his slowest leg. You can't compete against someone who not only bikes all the time but also has a much lighter bike than you. They did two laps around the trails at Great Glen then transitioned to the skate ski. Ryan made up a lot of time on this leg since he's gotten pretty good at skate. The sun came out at this point and warmed things up a lot. He was soaked in sweat when he came in to transition for the snowshoe run over to Pinkham Notch.

As soon as he left for the snowshoe, I took all the gear up to the car and drove over to Pinkham. As expected, the lot was already full so I had to park on the road. It wasn't bad, though, since I was almost even with the end of the lot on the Jackson side. I got my pack together for the run up Tucks then ran a coke, snickers and Ryan's windshirt over to his skis at the transition. I started my run from there. It was pretty slow going. My pack was pretty heavy with gear and the conditions were a little soft. Plus there were so many people to go around. I stopped my run just past Hojo's so that I could stop and put on my cold weather gear before heading into the bowl. The trail was completely chewed up just past the first climb so the skiers were switching to boot packing here. I didn't bother running at all. Got up to the bowl. And would you believe it? This was actually my first time in the bowl in the winter. And WOW, so amazingly beautiful. I didn't realize how far ahead I was so I ended up in the bowl for over an hour. It was chilly, but I was perfectly warm enough.

Ryan finally made his way up there. The ski route was pretty crazy. Two boot packs and two ski downs before they left the bowl to boot pack down to the Sherbie for the ski finish. It was so fun watching the skiing. Ryan was moving well up the boot pack. The first ski down was rough for everyone, but he made it look easy. There's no way in hell I would have been able to do that ski. Ryan would end up finishing 8th overall in the ski leg. I thought that was awesome.

As soon as Ryan headed down, I did, too. He beat me down since I was running. Skied his fastest time on the Sherbie ever. He ended up finishing 7th for the Solo men in whole race. He did so well overall! I was really happy for him! Over 20 miles total in 3:42:24. Next year will be even better since he'll have more time to train and hopefully will be running. Results.

He was pretty beat and had major leg cramping for hours after until I remembered I had this witch doctor stuff I had gotten in a race bag years before. Crazy enough, it worked, and almost immediately!

We went to Ledge Brewing for the awards even though he didn't win anything. We didn't know most of the people there, but we had our old acidoticRACING teammates to talk to. That was my first team, and I still really like most of the people on it. I was surprised at a few people who did talk to us that I wasn't expecting. Made me feel better about where we stand after being publicly raked through the mud because of the lies. We had some beers and tacos. Nice spot. Beer is just ok, but I'd go there again.

The next day was such a gorgeous day that we ventured over to King Pine for some recovery laps. It was shorts weather...even though I failed to wear shorts. Ryan was pretty tired and had a sore spot on his ankle so we just did 4 easy laps and had beers up top.

Strangely enough, Ryan's hip completely stopped hurting as soon as he finished the Inferno. Good timing, too, since running is back on the agenda as the snow fades away. I suppose I'm ready to get back into running shape although I'll really miss skiing. The only thing on the agenda right now is Wild Corn. After that, I don't have a race until May. I'd like to throw in a 5K race or two, but there really aren't any around. Racing really helps boost my fitness and trim down. I don't want to go back to racing every weekend, but I would like to get back to it a little bit.

Ryan and I have had a really good winter. We have a really good time together. I love him more every day and feel so lucky that we both took a chance on each other back in August. I know we haven't been together that long, but it feels like we have. Looking forward to summer adventures together.