This blog post has taken me a little longer than I planned on to write and post. Mainly due to an impromptu 'power nap' turning into a good hour and a half (ok, it was more like two hours) nanna nap a few hours post-long trail run this morning. Either I'm getting old (old-er?) or that was an awesomely challenging long run! The plan was for a 25km trail run out in the Watagans National Park, and when we reached the 12.5km turn around point, there were murmurs of 'we could push on and go for 30km?' however we all consented that, no, not this time and sensibly turned back from whence we came. However, somehow we ended up taking a wrong turn (on our out and back route, hmmm) we found ourselves running down a long, generous hill that later kept on giving on the way back up (one that prompted us to think, hmm, is this the way we came? Wouldn't we have remembered this extra hill?) and our 25km turned into a 30km anyway. Happy days!! I was not complaining.
This was an awesome run! There's just something about running through a forest, with good company / like minded people, not a car in sight, and a light drizzle on your face (and hair, which was turned into a dreadlock/rat's nest before too long). Pure bliss.
There were of course ups and downs. Quite literally. The first being the steepest and most challenging up, where you hike up some near vertical steps, stones and tree roots for almost half a kilometre's elevation. At the top the route opens up into bushland (after heading past some beautiful, iconic black boy trees) and then again into a wide path that dips up and down for the majority of the 25kms (which then became 30km, yay!). The first section was a rude awakening and quite a shock to my system. I am definitely out of practice with stairs and hiking! However, once at the top and the intensity mellowed somewhat, I felt myself really relax into this run. It wasn't nearly as slippery and wet underneath as I had expected (having had nothing but near torrential rain here in the Newcastle region all week) and the ground seemed pretty solid and not too slippery. Didn't fall in the mud once! Oh, and no leeches either, as we stuck to the main open track, phew! (Someone had mentioned that there would be leeches there sucking on to my feet/legs! So glad this turned out not to be the case.)
For those who are much more technology minded than me and want the official stats (rather than my vague 'up and down' write up) luckily my friend had the tools on hand to record what we did! (Thanks again Mick!) So the official stats are as follows:
This was an awesome run! There's just something about running through a forest, with good company / like minded people, not a car in sight, and a light drizzle on your face (and hair, which was turned into a dreadlock/rat's nest before too long). Pure bliss.
There were of course ups and downs. Quite literally. The first being the steepest and most challenging up, where you hike up some near vertical steps, stones and tree roots for almost half a kilometre's elevation. At the top the route opens up into bushland (after heading past some beautiful, iconic black boy trees) and then again into a wide path that dips up and down for the majority of the 25kms (which then became 30km, yay!). The first section was a rude awakening and quite a shock to my system. I am definitely out of practice with stairs and hiking! However, once at the top and the intensity mellowed somewhat, I felt myself really relax into this run. It wasn't nearly as slippery and wet underneath as I had expected (having had nothing but near torrential rain here in the Newcastle region all week) and the ground seemed pretty solid and not too slippery. Didn't fall in the mud once! Oh, and no leeches either, as we stuck to the main open track, phew! (Someone had mentioned that there would be leeches there sucking on to my feet/legs! So glad this turned out not to be the case.)
For those who are much more technology minded than me and want the official stats (rather than my vague 'up and down' write up) luckily my friend had the tools on hand to record what we did! (Thanks again Mick!) So the official stats are as follows:
Here are a few more shots from this awesome trail run this morning. Can't wait to go back and do it again (and maybe even further next time?). Trail running = extra endorphins for the day.
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