Hiking My Way Through Summer: Part 1 - The Jewel Basin

I tend have summers where I do things in clusters. Sometimes I am very focused on doing triathlons. Other times, it is bike riding and doing long group rides. Sometimes, I lose track of how many books I have read. This summer seemed to be spent backpacking and hiking (lots of day hikes).

First big backpacking trip was in July with my dad and 2 of my brothers (Nathan and Daniel). I think the idea for the trip began evolving sometime in January. I'm not exactly sure how I secured by invitation to participate in this boys' trip, but by June I was fully committed to going.

At the trail head, first day. Left to right: Craig (dad), Nathan, Travis, Daniel; front: Greg, me (Heather)

We had a couple of different destinations in mind, but settled on the Jewel Basin in western Montana. This was a perfect setting for my first major backpacking trip. First, it is only 30 minutes from Bigfork, where my grandparents live. Second, the trail up to the lakes climbs for about a mile and then levels off to follow a ridge line. So even though we hiked 3 miles into the lakes, it wasn't too bad.

Before I get too much into the hike itself, I have to share some funny stories about what happened before we even got to the trail head.

We were all meeting in Bigfork on July 4th. Daniel was responsible for bringing his bear vault to store food in since western Montana is prime bear country. Well, Daniel and Greg arrive in Bigfork about 3 in the afternoon and Nathan arrives about an hour later. We are reviewing who brought what gear and Daniel grimaces and says "I forgot the bear vault." Daniel...grrr. There isn't much in Bigfork, but there is a REI in Kalispell, 30 minutes away. And miracle of miracles, the REI is open until 6 p.m. We all pile into Daniel's truck and head to Kalispell.

While in Kalispell, Nathan realizes that he and Travis have forgotten their breakfast (oatmeal). Well, wouldn't you know, Walmart is next to REI. We spend about 30 minutes wandering REI making sure that we didn't forget anything else (really, when you walk into REI you should just say, "Here, take all my money."). Then we headed over to Walmart so Nathan could buy some oatmeal. Then it was back to Bigfork for dinner and watching fireworks around the lake.

As we are watching fireworks, the night becomes a bit chilly and everyone starts adding on layers. Greg, Daniel's 10 year old son, goes inside and grabs a blanket. When it was suggested that he put on long pants and a jacket, he responded that he didn't bring any. He had only packed shorts and short-sleeved shirts for hiking in the mountains! He said he got distracted when he was packing. Oh you can bet we gave his dad a bad time about not double checking Greg's packing.

The fireworks end and there is some discussion/disagreement on what time we should head out in the morning. Dad wants butts in seat by 7:30 a.m. Daniel thinks that is ridiculous. He's determined to slow the roll in the morning.

Morning comes and Dad is pacing and antsy starting about 7. We get out the door about 8 a.m. to head back into Kalispel, back to Walmart to find some clothes for Greg. FORTY-FIVE minutes later we are finished at Walmart and off to breakfast. After breakfast, it is finally time to drive to the trailhead.

After a bit of misdirection from the trail guide book, we made it to the trailhead around 10 a.m. We unloaded the gear, checked in with the ranger, snapped a quick picture and then we were off! Like I said, the trail climbs for about the first mile and then levels off for the next 1.5 miles. The last .5 miles into Birch Lake are pretty much down...which means pretty much up on the way out.

Taking a break at the trail junction

Birch Lake is a beautiful place to camp! But, we didn't know that we needed to examine the trails closely for goat fiber! More on that in a minute. During the hike in it was warm, sunny and nary a cloud in the sky. After dinner, there were storms clouds in the distance and over the course of the night, the clouds moved closer and closer. We all called it a night around 10 p.m. and each headed to their own sleeping arrangements. Dan and Greg were in one tent, Nathan and Travis in another. Dad in a hammock under a tarp and me in my own tent. I do not sleep well in the wild.

The rain started about 11 p.m. I tossed and turned, shivered from the cold, and tried to go to sleep. It was a futile effort. The rain stopped about 1 a.m. and then shortly after that, I heard things crash through the bushes. They were big crashes! My heart raced as I listened closely to see if I could figure out what was literally right outside of my tent. Hoof beats. That is what I heard. Relief! And as quickly as the hoof beats came, they disappeared.

I think I drifted off to sleep, only to be startled awake with my dad saying "Bugs, let me in." He got too cold in his hammock. I was happy to let him in! Note: a 2-person tent warms up about 10 degrees when you go from one person in the tent to 2 people in the tent. Dad got in, got settled, and was quickly back to dreamland. I, however, was now wide awake again.

Then the hoof beats returned. This time, there was enough disturbance to wake everyone up. I know they were awake because I heard Daniel saying "Go away bear. Go away bear. Is anyone else hearing this?" Yes, yes we are. I told him I think it is the mountain goats we had heard about from the ranger. Daniel unzips his tent and discovers we are on the goat highway! Those goats are right in our camp.

The goats hang around for an hour or so. After the goats leave, everyone but me goes back to sleep. The rain returns about 5 a.m.

The rain broke about 8 a.m. so we had a quick breakfast and got ready for our day hike to Crater Lake. The hike from Birch Lake to Crater Lake is about 5 miles. It's another fairly easy hike, especially without a 30-pound back on my back! We had a nice lunch at Crater Lake, but didn't stay very long because the mosquitoes were obnoxious!

Lunch at Crater Lake

That night the rain rolled in about 7 p.m. and stayed until about 2 a.m. I learned that my tent has some leaks and having a space blanket inside your sleeping bag is a life-saver (thanks to my brother, Nate, who happened to have a space blanket with him. Always the boy scout.) I slept better. The goats came back about 4 a.m. and stayed about an hour. Then I was up.

We decided we had enough of camping in the rain so we broke camp, snapped another picture (look at the happy faces!) and headed to Glacier National Park to do a day hike or two.

No pictures from Glacier, but we did a hike I've never done. We hiked into Avalanche Lake. It is a 5 mile hike that is totally doable, but we almost broke Greg. He was such a trooper on all of the other hikes, but being tired can get even the best of us. After a little rest, he rebounded and finished strong.

I am so glad I had this time with my dad, brothers and nephews. We laughed, we sang a lot of songs (well, my dad sang a lot of songs), we teased and enjoyed each others company. We also began planning for our next hike!

Light at the End of the Tunnel Marathon, June 9, 2019

The picture gives the result, but it doesn't tell the whole story.

I ran my first marathon in May of 2014. It was a completely miserable experience. I was doing a walk/run for most of the last half of the marathon. At about mile 24 I had an older gentleman say to me, "You're much to young to be walking." I remember wanting to punch the guy, but I literally didn't even have the energy to respond to him. I crossed the finish line in about 4 hours 40 minutes. I told David that I had now crossed running a marathon off of my bucket list and didn't need to do another.

But just like childbirth, after a couple of years you forget the pain and discomfort and figure that giving it another shot would be a grand idea. I also was secretly hoping that I would have a much better marathon time and would somehow qualify for Boston. I'm not sure if I even knew what kind of qualifying time I would need to have. Nevertheless, I signed up for my second marathon, the Oktoberfest Marathon in Leavenworth. I ran this race in October of 2016. While I did improve my time and finished in 4 hours 23 minutes, I still thought running the marathon was not a very enjoyable experience. I, again, bonked hard, but this time it wasn't until mile 18.

After 2 miserable marathons, I think most people would have called it quits and moved on to something a bit more enjoyable. But, I was still hungry for a Boston qualifying time. I also knew that I was soon moving up to another age group and the qualifying time for that age group seemed doable. You just needed to run a marathon in a mere 3 hours 55 minutes. I had a work colleague who was 50 years old and she had just run a 3:50 marathon. Certainly I could do the same!

This time I didn't let two years lapse before signing up for my next race. I signed up and ran my first Light at the End of the Tunnel marathon in June of 2017. I had a good race and ran a massive PR, finishing in 3:54:13. This was also a BQ! While David was elated for me, I was crushed because I knew that I had not beat the standard by enough. I wasn't going to Boston. I had done enough research to know that you need to beat it by at least two minutes (and as it turns out, for that year you needed to beat it by 3 minutes 28 seconds to get into Boston).

Feeling like I was so close to my goal, but needed some extra help to get there, I hired a running coach and signed up for the Skagit Flats Marathon in September of 2017. I had an excellent training cycle and was hitting all of my paces going into the race. My coach and I were both feeling confident that I would achieve my goal of running a 3:45. Unfortunately, I made a typical running mistake and started off too fast. I was solid through the first 15 miles, but started to slow at mile 16. Then mile 18 came and I was toast. I pushed until mile 20 and then it was a run/walk to those last 6 miles. I finished that marathon in 3:56:14. Even though I was nowhere near my goal time, I also wasn't far off of my PR. I felt like I could legitimately claim that I was a sub-4 hour marathon runner.

I went into maintenance mode for the rest of year, but prepared to run the Light at the End of the Tunnel Marathon again in June of 2018. My coach started up my training program in February with the focus on getting me to Boston. Training was going well until disaster struck at the end of April. I was finishing up an easy 5 mile run when I injured my SI joint. To this day, I am not sure how I hurt it, but it took me out of running for several months. I was so sad not to be able to try again for another PR at the LETM, especially since I had several friends who were going to run it that year. I did PT for about 8 weeks and then took it easy through most of summer. I did run a half-marathon at the end of October and finished 3rd overall woman and 1st in my age group! That was certainly a moral booster after the disappointing spring.

Unfortunately, after that half marathon, I hurt my foot. I know now that it was an overuse injury due to poor nerve to muscle communication. I spent November and December seeing the podiatrist and doing a lot of pool running. He released me to run again in January 2019 and just like a kid who has been deprived of her favorite treat, I indulged in being able to run again. I ran lots and lots of miles in those first weeks of January. That, of course, led to re-injuring my foot. This time the podiatrist sent me to physical therapy where I received the instruction to not run at all! Of course I was starting to freak out a little because I had signed up for the LETM back in November. I'm used to a 16-week training cycle to prepare for a marathon and now I was relegated to pool running, biking and yoga. No runnning. No weight training. I threw myself into my PT exercises in hopes that I would be back soon. But little tiny muscles in my neck needed to be re-trained and that just takes time.

Finally, in March of this year I was released to run. That left me 12 weeks to somehow, not only get in marathon shape, but try to be prepared enough to run a BQ time again. My physical therapist told me I needed to be smarter about my training so I looked for a running coach that trained using heart-rate training. The theory is that you run 80% of your runs at an easy effort, 1 run at a medium effort and 1 run at a hard effort. By keeping the effort easy, you increase your aerobic capacity. I figured that training at a slower pace might help prevent injury. I found a couple of great coaches and got to work.

David was completely skeptical of this training approach, not understanding how training at a slower-than-race-pace would have me prepared to meet my goal. I couldn't adequately explain it to him and he wouldn't read the articles I shared with him that explained the concept. So I told him, I'm just going to trust my coaches and the process and see what happens. I also was keying in on different fueling strategies because I was determined to not bonk again at mile 18.

My training went well. I kept my heart rate low on my easy runs. My 5k threshold tests showed that I was improving. I found a fuel that works amazingly well for me (UCAN super-starch). I ran several 18-22 mile runs and didn't ever really feel a bonk, except during PMS weeks. PMS weeks kill me! I can't keep my heart rate down and I'm sluggish on the long runs. The 12 week training cycle was compact, but worked.

Finally, June 9th came! This was probably the most prepared mentally and physically that I had been for a race. I was cautiously optimistic about running a 3:45, but I had also given myself permission to just run and enjoy the day. Whatever happened, happened. I held myself back just a bit in the first couple of miles and then let the course do the work (it is a gentle downhill course so gravity helps!) the rest of the way down. I had told myself that there would be no breaks during this marathon, but at about mile 10 my body was saying different. I took a few minutes to really check-in to see if I could figure out why I was feeling off and discovered that I needed to pee! Fortunately, the course is a trail through the forest so I could find a nice bush to pee behind. Once my bladder was empty, I felt so much better and continued on my way.

I had brought music along to listen to if I felt I needed it at the end. I was prepared to go until mile 18 without it. Mile 18 came and I was feeling awesome so I kept on going, because no breaks, remember. I knew that I would see David somewhere around mile 21 so I kept plugging away. He was with me for about a 1/2 mile and when he left me at mile 22 I decided to plug in the tunes. I'll admit that the brief walk break that I took to get my headphones in and iPod turned on was a refreshing reprieve. And the best part was that the break wasn't long enough to really foul-up my time. I still kept it under a 9-minute mile.

David found me again at mile 25. By this time, I knew it was going to be tight to meet my goal, but as long as I didn't slow down, I would make it. Mile 25.2...exactly one mile left. David ran with me for all but the last 400 meters of that mile. He told me to give it everything I had as I finished. While it wasn't my fastest mile, it also wasn't my slowest. Matter of fact, I ran that last mile in 8:10 and finished strong.

I crossed the line in 3:44:09. I beat the new Boston standard (which is 3:50 for my age group) by almost  6 minutes. While I know that Boston isn't a guarantee, I feel pretty confident that I will be running in the Boston Marathon in April 2020. I can't wait!

The F Word

Yes, that F word.

The four letter word that rhymes with truck.

The mother of all swear words. The word uttered by Ralphie as he watched the bolts he was supposed to be holding go flying through the air. The word that earned him a bar of soap in his mouth as soon as he got home.

I was about Ralphie's age when I first used that word. I think I was yelling at some boy in our neighborhood. My dad must have been the one who overheard me yell the expletive because he is the one who meted out my punishment. My consequence was not a bar of soap in my mouth. That would have been too easy. No, my punishment involved listening  to my dad explain what the F-word truly meant. That it was a derogatory slang word for sex. He then went on to make sure that I understood what sex was. I don't remember his exact words, but I'm sure I was squirming as he was talking to me about the subject. A bar of soap in my mouth would have probably been a preferred consequence.

I was reminded of that long-ago conversation the other day as I read an Instragram post that ended with the 'Grammer saying she ended her workout feeling strong AF. AF is short for "as f ***". AF has become a phrase that people often use to add emphasis to how they are feeling.

But as I read the AF, I had myself a giggle as I substituted the word "sex" for the f-word. After all, that is what the f-word means. So this girl finished her workout feeling strong as sex. Well, good for her.

Then I began to think, what would happen if people really started thinking about what they were saying and using the real word, not the slang term? Can you imagine...

Guilty AF turns into guilty as sex. Wow, if sex is causing you guilt, sounds like an issue that needs to be resolved.

Dirty AF turns into dirty as sex. Well, that says a little more about you than I really want to know.

Happy AF turns into happy as sex. Sex should be a happy thing, so I guess this one isn't too bad.

Or how about, when crying out "F***" in frustration, you just yell out "SEX". Hope that brings you some relief.

Anyway, the point is, I was reminded of my dad's lecture about what the F word really means and the phrase AF sounds pretty silly if you substitute the word "sex" for the f-word.

Oh, after my dad talked to me, I did stop using that word for awhile. I went through a stretch in junior high and high school where it was my favorite word. But sometime during my senior year in high school, I just quit using it. Haven't said it since...and apparently, can't type it out in full either. LOL.