RUNNING, GADGETS AND KAYAKINGS

It's been a busy couple of weeks! After my last post I didn't boat that weekend since the water levels are going down and the season is pretty much over unless you have a Westwater permit or willing to travel... I HAVE AND AM WILLING TO DO BOTH! I refuse to give up my kayaking season without a fight....more on that later :)

Two weekends ago I tried to take advantage of the extra time, since we didn't boat anything, to get caught up with my day to day stuff. I went to Sports Authority and got some new running shoes, a heart rate monitoring watch and few pairs of yoga pants. I also got a holder for my Ipod since up until this point I have been holding it in my hand and it was awkward!

I've gotten into a routine now and things are starting to flow better for me. The new shoes made a huge difference! I was using an old pair of walking shoes which had no cushion and were pretty worn out. I got a pair Asics Gel which I love, they work well outside and on the treadmill, which I didn't think that would be the case for whatever reason. I started using the heart rate monitor and staying in my 70 - 80% range for at least 30 minutes. The first few days I struggled a little. I've gotten my schedule down so I do this 5 days a week and then either boat on the weekends or flex that time during the week so I rest 1 or 2 days in there. I keep upping the time every few days too. I'm working my way to 1 hour walk/run on that schedule. By the end of the first week I managed to run for a entire song and I had a little involuntary wohoo...it was a goal I set for myself, to be able to run for an entire song without huffing and puffing and to enjoy it :) I can run for a couple of songs in a row now, but no where near the 3 mile mark yet. Yesterday I met my friend Patty and we ran with the dogs on the Bobolink Trial in Boulder. It went a lot better than I thought it would. We slowly jogged the entire thing...took about 40 mins and total I believe it was 2.5 miles or so. It was the first time Patty had jogged in a long time, so she was going a lot slower than my pace was originally. I couldn't find a good place to keep time with her, it was either a little to fast to walk and a little too slow to jog, so there was a mixture, but I tried to keep jogging. Going again on Thursday...it'll get easier. It was nice to have a partner....when I would have talked myself into walking she kept going and vice versa. The dogs loved it! I look forward to jogging now...It's a nice release of the daily stress (mostly work), I get to zone out for a half hour or more and have no worries. I can probably say now that this will not be what its like when I start biking....blech...not looking forward to that piece!! Swimming I could do all day every day! And by 'run' in this blog I mean slowly jogging....very slowly. Once I meet the marker where I can run consistently for 30 mins, I'm going to start timing myself.

OK enough about running....I wanna talk about boating :) Last weekend I went on an overnight trip which was a blast! On the Colorado River by the Colorado/Utah border there is a long stretch of flat water that flows through a gorgeous canyon. The run is called Ruby Horse Theif.
It's a float...there's not a lick of whitewater on the entire 26 mile stretch. You really need to know this information before you do it, otherwise you could get pretty restless. I did this with the small group of people that will be going to costa rica with me, it was intended to be a bonding trip for us and there were a couple others too. Total we had a group of 12, two rafts for support and the rest of us were in our kayaks. Friday night around 8:30Pm or so (5 hour drive from Denver) Patty and I arrived at the put in at Loma. It's a boat launch patrolled by the BLM

We were the first of the group to arrive but were followed closely by a few others. We setup tents on the beach of the boat launch and settled in for the night. It was relatively cool and we were about 10 feet from the river on the beach so I slept in my long johns, hat and 0 degree sleeping bag. I was comfy! Morning came and we had to beat cheeks to rig up the rafts with our gear and get a move on. Campsites in the canyon are first come first server even with the BLM's sign up sheet at the put in. If we wanted a site big enough for our 12 person group we needed to get there first. Did I mention it was ALL FLAT... ALL OF IT!!! We had to make our own entertainment.
The Canyon is gorgeous.... here's a few pics from the early AM at the boat launch, riggin the rafts and the other boats getting ready to launch (not all of them were with us, only kim's raft in this pic, in the forefront)...


And we're off.... Day 1 floating (I'm the orange boat), chatting, laughing and beautiful views.......








Our campsite was easy enough to find with this tell tale rock formation it was about 12 miles into the day going only 4 miles an hour.....


Our campsite was Ok, not what we originally wanted as the other was stolen by an inconsiderate group that we didn't like much. But not the end of the world. We de-rigged the rafts got our tents set up and started dinner. There is a fire ban in the canyon so no campfire but we made do and chatted a little until we all realized how tired we were. Right around the time everyone went to bed it started to sprinkle....then rain....then downpour the entire night!....and by morning it was off an on until we all started to wake up which the rain then stayed at a constant 'on'! Breakfast was served under a rain flap, and we rigged up the rafts in the rain while sliding down the muddy hill. It was a weird night because of the rock we were on it must have been retaining heat because I felt like I was being slow roasted by morning...it was SOOO HOT! And because of how much it rained we all woke up in a puddle. Once out of the sleeping bag and off the heat rock it was quite chilly. I didn't even take off my long johns... I boated the rest of the day in all my rain gear plus my long johns...... burr!


Once we were on the water again we had some more gorgeous scenery.....
Black Rocks is the name, pretty obvious right :)


A couple miles into the second day we crossed into Utah... the boarder is marked on the canyon wall in this picture look for the white in the middle of photo.....


After 26 miles over two days it was over...we arrived at the Westwater put in and did a few hours worth of work to get everything taken down and packed back into our cars... I was happy as could be... on the water and with my friends, the weekend couldn't have been better :) wish you were here!

I don't know what's wrong with this thingy!

I have no idea what's wrong with the format of this blog... I changed the template so maybe that'll do the trick. I tried to make the last one all colorful, but apparently that screwed it up. Try posting comments now and see if it works.

What's happened lately..... Last weekend I went boating on Saturday with a women who asked me to help her get started in kayaking. The woman who does my hair also does her and mentioned I was a kayaker, so we exchanged phone numbers via our hairdresser. She was nice enough and I took her to boat Deckers which is a classic beginner run. She had only been in a boat once before which I mis understood her I guess when she was originally telling me what's she's done as far as learning. But she was very stable in her boat and wasn't scared at all. We came up to the Chutes which is the only significant part of the run and normally portaged by beginners. She said she wanted to do it and seemed very stable in her boat so I agreed. We made it through the zig zaggy part which a lot of people have a hard time with and she managed to get pushed into an eddy at the top just before the entrance to the chutes. That was a bit stressful as she got a little stuck and didn't know how to get herself out. I was ahead of her because she was following my line so I had to catch an eddy in the middle of the meat and try to ferry upstream to help her out. We got her out of her boat and into a safer position. I asked again if she was ok (if she wasn't it was going to get interesting) and she seemed fine. She said she was good and she trusted me, so we started off towards the entrance to the chutes. I went down first, got to the bottom and waited. She took a couple strokes then flipped over by the lateral wave at the top and swam the rest of the rapid. I made sure she was ok, then got her boat to shore, chased her paddle and attempted the rescue of her lost shoe. I had to walk through some brush on the side of the river to go make sure she could get in her boat. She was fine and we were off to finish the run which went seamlessly. She had a blast and the rental boat she had for the day she ended up buying when she went to return it. She's hooked!! SUCKER!! I love it when people get hooked it's so much fun to watch when someone gets that rush and can't stop smiling about it! Once I got home my legs started to itch...to the point I thought I was going to loose the first layer of flesh. I started to get tiny little blisters from my knees down and quickly realized the brush I walked through was POISON IVY! SUPER! Oh well, it's all part of it, it'll heal!

Tuesday night I met my girlfriend Patty for a hike just outside of Boulder with the doggies. It was great, we walked next to a little stream that my dogs were in and out of the entire time! I love watching them play. At the trail head we saw a little family with small children. My dogs will not hurt a fly and have had kids pull on them, love on them and everything else...and they LOVE IT! Obviously strangers don't know that, so the three little kids (all 5 or 6 and maybe a 3 year old) just stopped dead in their tracks when they saw the dogs coming. Olive was taller then almost all of them so it was probably pretty intimidating for the little kiddos. My dogs stopped in front of them and Desil immediately sits down in front of this little girl....waiting for her to pet him. She looks at me and I said 'I think he likes you, do you want to pet him?'. She nods with a big grin and gives him a bear hug! It was so cute. Desil sat quietly until she was done then gave her a huge slobbery kiss and bolted down to the water! Baxter the elderly beagle (Patty's dog) came with as they're all inseparable. This pic is when I was dog sitting Baxter......... hyper and then the rare 3 secs when they weren't moving...............................
On Wednesday I had an excellent conversation with and old friend who I've learned might be visiting family out here. I think it's been at least 5 years...maybe closer to 6 since I've seen this friend and I really hope it works out where we can at least squeeze in a dinner during that visit! Hopefully we'll have a little more time but I'll take what I can get!

Tonight I just got back from another hike with the dogs and Patty. She mentioned today that she used to be on the cross country team when she was in HS! PERFECT!! So, next week we're going to jog instead of walk the trail. I'm stoked...I FOUND A RUNNING BUDDY!

I will have some time this weekend to get that Mom and Dad trip posted I hope...I can't wait to share it, it was such a good time!

till next time.....

To keep you interested.......

Still working on the Mom and Dad road trip post. I took too many pictures as usual. It will likely be the longest post you'll ever read!

I just saw the comments you guys left when we were on the road.... Mom and Dad CRACK ME UP! We laughed... a lot! Good times! So here's a little game to keep your interest in this Monster BLOG I keep talking about. And as a bonus here's a little pic for you.....
To explain why I have this is kind of funny.... King and Queen of technology meant to copy a few pictures that I had once taken and downloaded to their laptop to a CD. I'm pretty sure they have no idea but they included on that cd, EVERY PICTURE THEY'VE EVER TAKEN! Two years ago when I was home, Izzy's hospital pictures, ALL of their Ireland photos, the rest of Dad's fishing trips, Jacobs Halloween pictures from last year or maybe earlier...everything!!! Too funny!



Time to play 'Who dun it'

Perps... Mom OR Dad ?

While driving on the Million Dollar Highway (very curvy) in the mountains and rounding the top of an 'S', perp turns on the right blinker. Perp is asked 'Um, Are you practicing for the next exit (hysterical laughter ensued)?'. Perp says in a very serious tone 'You keep laughing, SOMEDAY their going to pull me over.....and they'll give me an 'Excellent driver award', you'll see!'




I quit smoking....today is day 17. I made a deal with myself that for the first week which was the hardest I can do whatever I want. I was so tired that I barely moved all week except to take the dogs to the park for chuck it in between naps. But I'm over that part and I have been running almost everyday, but sometimes every other. I only do 20 to 30 mins, and still walk a lot, but I'm getting to longer and longer stretches of running. I also only do it during the week since I'm usually boating on the weekends. Talk about starting from scratch, it's very obvious I was NEVER a runner! I'll get there though...eventually.


IT'S OFFICIAL. I'M GOING TO COSTA RICA AGAIN...THIS TIME TO KAYAK!! I'm going with a small group of women (a couple guys too). It's before the parents get there. But it wouldn't have mattered as we'll be in the mountains jungle where the rivers are and on the opposite side of the country! It's going to be so much fun, I really can't wait!

That's it!