Equinox Marathon

 I drove up to Fairbanks last night and ran the Equinox Marathon for my 4th time today. The fall colors are out and it was almost perfect weather. It was cold enough that I needed to keep my windbreaker on the whole way, but even with some pretty strong wind, I never needed my hat or gloves. It seemed like quite a struggle most of the way. I think I may have been tired from the 6 hour drive. The first long hill is always kind of a challenge. After I reached the top of that, I was able to run at my usual pretty slow speed. Things were going pretty well until mile 11. At that point I started feeling unusually exhausted. Not quite dizzy, but even wondering if I was going to need to stop. But I ate one of my fuel gels and suddenly felt back to normal. I suppose my blood sugar was just a little low since I hadn't eaten much for dinner last night and only a muffin for breakfast. This race is a trail race with long narrow steep trails most of the way. There is an area called the Tunnel that is basically just a tunnel of high trees that creates a canopy over the trail. Halfway through the tunnel, there is a gorgeous view over the countryside. Last year I took an amazing picture at that spot. Today the fall colors weren't quite as spectacular, but the picture I took with my phone today looked almost the same. Brilliant fall colors. My friend Alice and her brother were planning to just walk the course so I knew they would be somewhere behind me. From the top of Ester Dome, the course goes down the hill to a turnaround spot around mile 15. Just as I reached the beginning of that descent, on my return to the top, Alice and her brother passed me heading down. I'm not sure if that indicates how slowly I was running or how incredibly fast they were walking, but they were just a few miles behind me. Once back on top the course heads down the other side of the mountain. The steepest spot is a very steep straight down area nicknamed the Chute. It follows the powerline straight down the fall line until it takes a turn to the left. Fortunately, I'm fairly good at running down steep hills. I basically hop from rock to rock and make very good time on all of the downhill areas. The rest of the course is basically downhill, but there are still about 8 more miles to the finish line. But after so many miles, even flat stretches had become quite challenging. But I kept a fairly steady pace and happily finally reached the finish line. My time was very slow, but 2 minutes faster than last year. 8:45:42. That's a long time to be on my feet. I was very tired. I waited for my friends who arrived about 45 minutes later. We went to the awards banquet after the race and I finally had some real food. Pizza which was delightful! I did get an award for first in my age category. Female 75-79. I had zero competition and would have won if I had crawled across the finish line at 10 hours. But I always say, I beat the folks who stayed home! It was fun in a very exhausting way. Driving back to Palmer in the morning.

View in the Tunnel

Age Group Medal

Me sporting my medal

Hatcher Pass & Reed Lake Trail

 Mark and I drove up to Hatcher Pass, with nothing special in mind. It was icy cold and windy up there so we didn't linger. But it was very beautiful and we took a couple of pictures before heading lower to Archangel Road. It was calm and not quite so cold down there. We started walking up the Reed Lakes Trail. I knew we were not prepared for a long hike. But it was so pretty out there that we just kept going. I could tell  Mark was ready to turn back but I kept saying we should go on to at least the cutoff trail to Snowbird since he had never been that far on the trail. So we continued. It was a nice day for photos and I saw that he took quite a few. The creeks were running high and were so beautiful. We did get to the trail split towards Snowbird and walked a short distance further toward Reed Lakes. After we crossed the first little bridges, things start to get very rocky and wet, so we decided to turn back. I'm sure the many creek crossings required on the way to the lakes, would have been quite a challenge with the high water. But he really enjoyed seeing this part of the trail. It's beautiful and wild back there.

Hatcher Pass View

Summit Lake

Reed Creek

Didilkama Peak

Pioneer Ridge

 It was pouring rain at my house and forecast to rain until about 4 pm today. The Valley Wanderers had planned to hike partway up the Pioneer Ridge Trail at least to the first picnic table. It's a very steep hike but always a nice 2000 foot climb. Jo, Jane and I were the only ones who decided to go regardless of the miserable weather conditions. Those two were a little smarter than I was because they came prepared with ice grippers on their shoes. I don't like to wear them unless I'm on snow and ice, plus my hiking shoes do remarkably well even in muddy conditions. They did fine on the way up. It continued to rain, but got lighter as we climbed. But the trail was very slippery and extremely muddy. I really had no trouble and we all made it to the picnic table. But the clouds were swirling all around us and we really didn't have much of a view. Above the table the rest of the mountain and trail were completely obscured. We had our lunch and decided there wasn't much point in continuing higher. As we started our descent, I realized my shoes that had been great on the way up, were not so much on the way down. I picked my way down and slipped and slid and fell at least 6 times. Suddenly I became a strong believer in always bringing my spikes no matter what time of year. I really struggled and was totally covered in mud by the time we got down. But we all had a good laugh. My spikes are now permanent residents of my hiking backpack. My clothes were so muddy that I couldn't even unzip my rain pants to remove them. I had to take off my shoes to pull the muddy pants off inside out. I didn't want any of the muddy stuff touching the inside of my car so I piled it all on top of my inside out rainfly, and drove home in my socks. Hosed it all off and tossed it all in my washing machine when I got home. But all in all, it was a fun yet challenging 4 mile hike and of course a great workout.

Me

Jane & Jo at the picnic table

Jane & Jo

Matanuska Peak Trail

I have been wanting to climb Matanuska Peak all summer, but it keeps raining, making it impossible. Our Valley Wanderers group had planned to hike up to the new picnic table that is close to where the summit climb begins. So I had planned to take my camping gear and spend the night then get up the next morning and go to the summit alone. However, that was dependent on the weather forecast. The forecast wasn't too bad this morning but for the last few days I've been seeing the snow level descend the mountain. It's getting pretty deep up there. So taking that into consideration and the fact that it was pouring rain as I left my house, I left the camping gear and that plan home in my closet! It stopped raining by the time we reached the trailhead and our hike to the picnic table was actually quite nice. Clouds were floating around but the peak mostly remained visible. The last 2000 feet of the climb is very rocky and I didn't feel comfortable trying to climb on the rocks in snow. The howling wind reminded me that I had made the right decision. We didn't linger for long at the picnic table because it started to rain, causing us to start our descent sooner than planned. Several of the group decided to take their time and pick blueberries on the way down. But four of us elected to try going down the much less traveled and less maintained, but somewhat shorter, McRoberts Creek Trail. That turned out to be delightful. The main trail had been quite muddy and often had deep puddles that we had to negotiate. This trail was much steeper but there was hardly any mud. The vegetation was very high and we hoped there weren't any bears or moose hiding in it. But it was actually quite nice hiking. I loved how it followed the creek most of the way down, which made for nice views and the pleasant sound of rushing water. It rained lightly most of the way back to the cars, but we all had our raingear and stayed dry enough. I guess I will need to wait until next summer to climb Matanuska Peak because it doesn't look like there is much chance of that snow melting until next July! But it was a beautiful hike with the beginnings of some lovely fall colors. The clouds and fog were enchanting. 

Matanuska Peak

McRoberts Creek

Mud Lake Explore

 I've been investigating the Seven Mile Canoe Trail here in the Palmer Wasilla area. It's a seven mile course along the Cottonwood Creek drainage that begins in Palmer at Finger Lake. At the far end of the lake there is a short portage up a little hill that leads to Cottonwood Lake. From there the traveler paddles the full length of Cottonwood Lake to the outlet creek which is once again Cottonwood Creek. There is a culvert beneath N Shoreline Drive that always sounded like a possible problem for my kayak. But the trail does follow this section of the creek to Mud Lake, a lake with no public access, except for property owners with homes on its shore. At the far end of Mud Lake, once again the waterway becomes Cottonwood Creek until it comes to a much bigger highway, called Seward Meridian Parkway. I have heard that many people choose to portage across the highway rather than negotiate that culvert. Once beyond this obstacle, one can paddle the longest section of lake, Wasilla Lake. I would love to paddle this entire route but due to fast currents along the creek, it makes the most sense to travel in the downstream direction from Finger Lake to Wasilla Lake. Traveling both ways would make for a very long trip with some serious upstream paddling. So I have been hoping to find a kayaking partner willing to do the trip while placing a car at each end. Or, perhaps someone willing to meet me at the end point and toss me and my boat out at the Finger Lake boat launch. So far, I have found no takers!

I have paddled the whole length of Finger Lake, the whole length of Cottonwood Lake, hiked the portage between the two and found the outgoing creek to Mud Lake. Due to conflicting information I have heard regarding the two culverts, I started today by driving to both culverts and walking down from the roads to check them out. The one under N Shoreline Drive looked very short and easy to negotiate. But the one under Seward Meridian looked like something well worth the extra effort of the portage across the highway. The water is high right now and moving very fast. There are also a couple of posts in the middle of the stream with the potential of tripping up a passing boat. After seeing that, I decided that I'll likely never go through that culvert. But I wanted to explore Mud Lake. Access to the creek from the dirt trail off Seward Meridian was a perfect place to put my kayak in the water. I paddled upstream for a while against fairly strong but still easy to paddle current until I reached the actual lake. I used my AllTrails iPhone app to navigate to the inlet creek from Cottonwood Lake and paddle up it until I reached the culvert. The water coming through that culvert is much stronger than the rest of the creek. I tried to paddle up through the culvert but quickly found that my paddle was too long to fit through the culvert. That made it a definite one way trip! I pulled my boat out of the water and hiked up the embankment. crossed the road and put in on the other side of the culvert. Then I floated easily through it, using my hands to guide me by touching the culvert roof. I finished paddling completely around Mud Lake and back down to the stream to my car parked off Seward Meridian Parkway. 2.6 miles total. 

So now, I have done all of the canoe trail in pieces, except for the long stretch of Wasilla Lake. Once the rain stops I think I will just put in at Wasilla Lake and paddle to Seward Meridian.  At least I know exactly how to do the trail and that there is nothing serious to fear. I'd love to spend a nice sunny day doing the whole trip. 

Mud Lake

Cottonwood Creek

Trumpeter Swans

Northshore Drive Culvert

Mud Lake

Today's Route

Mt Eklutna & Ridge

 Hiked the Mt Eklutna Trail with the Valley Wanderers today. Just 4 of us went, Jane, Erin, Kim and me. We had an interesting plan. From the top of the mountain you can see that the trail continues along the ridge. Looking on the map there is a peak labeled 4009/1222, which is simply the elevation in feet/meters. It's about one mile past the Mt Eklutna summit. Our goal was to reach that peak. As we were climbing, the clouds started to gather near the summit and we wondered if we would even see the view from the top. Once we reached the saddle before the final ascent, we were completely fogged in. But occasionally the clouds would lift and we could get a glimpse of the view below. We continued on past the Eklutna summit, in and out of the fog. The trail is vague in places and involves some minor rock climbing to negotiate some large rocky cliffs. But we had no trouble getting around them. The farther we hiked, the worse the clouds situation became. We stopped and had lunch on a point where another ridge descends and eventually joins the trail we had climbed from below. We had decided to take that route down, for variety and to avoid the steep loose scree section that we had climbed from the saddle to the Mt Eklutna summit. Our goal peak of 4009 showed its face now and then through the clouds, but mostly stayed hidden. The cloud layer was thickening rather than lifting. The ridge had a deep drop before it climbs to that distant peak and we started having serious reservations about trying to negotiate that route if we couldn't see the route ahead. We also knew we would not be able to see the view if we did manage to get there. We waited a little while to see if the cloud cover got better to take the alternative route down. There is no trail on that route, making it sketchy if we didn't have visibility. But conditions just continued to worsen. So we turned back and descended along our original route, leaving peak 4009/1222 for another day. It was still a lovely 8 mile cloudy adventure. 

Harp Mountain Traverse to Hanging Valley and South Fork Trail

 It was raining when I left home so I was a little skeptical about how well this hike was going to go. It's been raining so much lately and everything is flooded. The hike we had planned involved many miles along the South Fork of Eagle River, and crossing of several contributing streams. We placed some cars at the South Fork Trailhead parking lot and drove two cars to the Harp Mountain trailhead. We figured we would get wet feet but decided to take that chance. First we hiked to 5000 feet on the steep Harp Mountain Trail. Once up there we continued along the high ridge until we reached a narrow pass that has a thin grassy trail that leads down to the Hanging Valley Trail. The walk along the ridge was interesting and at times quite challenging as we negotiated huge rock prominences surrounded by boulder fields. At times I found it a little nerve-wracking, but never really dangerous. We had incredible views in every direction while up on the ridge. We could look down across the valley and see Hanging Valley lake on the other side. It was somewhat slippery and muddy at times on our descent. Meg slipped and fell at one point and apparently her brand new iPhone 14 slipped out of her pack never to be seen again. She didn't notice it until we had gone way too far to try to go look for it. With no cell service, we couldn't even try to call it. 
We had to cross a couple of fast moving creeks. I wasn't sure I could make it across but found I could jump farther than I thought. None of us ended up with wet feet. It was pretty chilly and also windy so it had dried out the brush so we didn't end up soaking wet as we had initially feared. We made our way down to the Hanging Valley Trail then joined the South Fork Trail and finally reached the South Fork Trailhead where I had parked my car. It was a beautiful 10 mile hike and we were all so delighted that it was mostly sunny and we all stayed dry.