WE'RE BACK!

HIKE: New Canyon

HIKERS: Amy, Kim & Hope

TIME: not very fast

WEATHER: beautiful, sunny day in the 60's!

KIM'S NOTES: It was great to be hiking again, especially in this lovely weather we are having today! (Wish it would last longer than just today...) I got tired easily because I haven't exercised for a MONTH, but we made it to the Lone Pine marker. We are back on the trail and happy about it!

NEW CANYON

HIKERS: Amy, Hope the dog
SUMMIT: 50 min, Petey Bishops TH
RT DISTANCE: 4.5 miles,
RT TIME: 1:30 approx
ELEVATION GAIN: 1000 ft

AMY'S NOTES: I love Gmaps Pedometer. It allows you to figure out all the mileage and elevations with sat images and road maps. Check it out. http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=3659401

SOUTHERN LOOP (via 100 E 300 E)

BIKERS: Amy
RT DISTANCE: 10 miles (2 Loops)
TIME PER LOOP: 26 min average

AMY'S NOTES: The great thing about going uphill is that you get to go downhill. The loop is one I used to run and is a total of 5 miles. Today I lapped it twice for a total of 10 miles.

DIRECTIONS: Starts at the corner of 100 E 100 S, south on 100 E to the end of the pavement at the Christensen Rd, then back on 300 E.

LEGACY PARKWAY TRAIL

BIKERS: Amy, Brooklyn
RT DISTANCE: 16 miles

AMY'S NOTES: Started at the North Salt Lake Center St. trailhead and pedaled north. The first of 8 legs in the bike portion of the triathlon. Mile 4 brought a flat tire due to a staple, but with the help of a couple of strangers I was back up in a few minutes (thanks Alan). I did learn a few things I did not know before. I have a tube in my tire (as opposed to tubeless), compressed air cartridges are really cool, schraeder valves are old school, it takes a special tool to remove a tire, squishy stretchy pants are a good investment, and if the store you bought them at forgets to remove the anti-theft device don't try to remove it with a hammer.

IRONMAN TRIATHLON

AMY'S NOTES: Let the games begin! I'm excited silly about this. I've decided to do an Ironman Triathlon, newbie style. I have 2 weeks to complete all the mileage. A local woman participated in a similar event while living elsewhere and has decided to get it started in our rural outpost of a town. Interestingly, we have a strange abundance of very athletic outdoor minded people in these parts. (One of the things I love about this place.) Despite my prodding, cajoling, and general harassment, I couldn't convince Kim to do it with me. She did, however, agree to do a handful of the legs with me. Yeah Kim! (Why is everyone not as excited about this as I am?) Tomorrow we will do 9.2 miles up Bald. I am worried about the torn acl and IT band but plan to go slow and put in the time rather than focus on speed. This will be the first significant physical effort since last fall. I think it's just what my body and soul needs, injuries included. The loose plan is to break up the mileage by day and hike rather than run to save the knee. I also plan to swim at Palisade rather than the pool because I can't stand chlorine. I have the least experience with biking, and in anticipation of a sore saddle bought a new ergonomic squishy bike seat and gel filled bike shorts, which I've always laughed at in the past. :-) I'll be using the bike I've had since college and my kayak helmet as a bike helmet. Not exactly high tech, but it will work. This is the newbie version of a tri after all.

Swim 2 legs (1.25 miles ea) @ Palisade
Hike 3 legs (9 miles ea)
Bike 8 legs (14 miles ea)

TOTAL MILES:
Swim 2.5
Run 26.2
Bike 112

"WANNA COME OUT 'N PLAY?"

HIKERS: Kim, Amy, HopE the dog
HIKE: New Canyon
WEATHER: 55 F, or so
RT TIME: 1 hour

AMY'S NOTES: To which I responded, "YES! I'd love to run away from home for the afternoon!" And so began our New Canyon afternoon adventure. We both are clearly feeling the cabin fever of winter and work.

BALD MOUNTAIN- SIDE DOOR

HIKERS: Amy, Kim, HopE

SUMMIT: 40 min.

RT TIME: 3:25 pm- 4:38 pm

WEATHER: 40 F -- way warmer than we thought it would be.

NOTES: tough conditions today. lots of mud and slushy, heavy snow. we chose the cross-country route most of the time to keep the mud from the road from building up on our shoes. It was a great work-out and a beautiful spring day.

ICY CHILL - NEW CANYON

HIKERS: Kim, Amy, HopE the dog
RT TIME: about an hour
WEATHER: fairly cold

AMY'S NOTES: A few days of warm weather and a snow storm thrown in between made for an icy hard-packed landscape yesterday morning. Classic Utah. The signs and symptoms of the closing of winter are in the air. Hallelujah! Look closely at the picture of HopE.

SLUSH & MUD- NEW CANYON

HIKERS: Kim , Amy, Hopie the dog

RT TIME: 1 hour, 10 min. to Lone Pine Hill

WEATHER: nice, brisk hiking weather

KIM'S NOTES: Whew, this really got us back into the thick of it. We really felt it in our calves, so it was a good work out. Lots of melting, slushy snow, thus the mud, but a great hike. May I just stress again how great it is to get out and hike again!

MAIN CANYON TEST HIKE

{Insert Amy's Photo Here }

HIKERS: Kim, Amy, Hope the dog

WEATHER: cold, frosty morning

SUMMIT: 24 minutes (?)

KIM'S NOTES: Wow, it's been a long time since we hiked and posted. Amy's been holed up with her injuries, so I have been doing other things for exercise. It was great to get out on the trail again. Felt good to do something besides running or reps in front of the TV.

SANPETE FOOTHILLS

AMY'S NOTES: This is post #101. A really cold but beautiful late afternoon walk. Smitten with the light and fresh snow. A busted knee and a sick dog makes for slow walking. Call it a meander. Hope is the only one with any agility to speak of these days and she certainly has enough for all. The first big snow of winter. Soft, powdery, Utah snow. And the warm yellow light of the desert in december. The dogs love it - it's what Bernese Mountain dogs were bred for. They are utterly in their element.

LITTLE WILD HORSE & BELL CANYONS LOOP, SAN RAFAEL SWELL

HIKERS: Kim, Cory, Dane, Drew, Christian, Amy, Brook
WEATHER: 60's, Sunny
RT TIME: 3.5 hours
DISTANCE: 7.5 miles

AMY'S NOTES: This is a very accessible hike in San Rafael Swell about 5 miles from Goblin Valley State Park. We started at the parking lot trailhead for Little Wild Horse and looped back through Bell Canyon. The midsection connecting the 2 canyons is a multiple use dirt road with full sun exposure. Wild Horse is a great canyon for running up and down walls - demonstrated best by Christian! More detailed info and maps on Tom Jones' website: http://www.canyoneeringusa.com/utah/swell/little.htm

CANYON ROAD- IN THE SNOW

HIKERS: Kim, Amy, and the dogs

TIME: 8:30 am- 9:30 am

WEATHER: 24 f, snowing

KIM'S NOTES: It was interesting to be hiking in the snow again. I had some mixed feelings about it. It was beautiful, no doubt about that, but a little too early in the weather scheme of things for us to be getting 4-8 inches of snow. Nice hike though.

ZION, CORAL PINK SAND DUNES

Walking on the petrified dunes.


The actress.


Modeling the hair piece.

AMY'S NOTES: Spent the weekend in Zion National Park shooting an experimental film short. I didn't have too much time for hiking but did manage a few solitary wanderings up side canyons in the petrified sand dune area. We also spent some time shooting in Coral Pink Sand Dune State Park which looks just as the name describes - coral pinkish, dunish, and very sandy. Beautiful weather in the 70's.

GREEN RIVER DAILY

AMY'S NOTES: A beautiful weekend on the Green. Ran from Buckley Wash to Swazey's a couple of times with bike shuttles. Forgot the tent, forgot the bike seat, forgot my paddle, lost my wallet... Slept in the tandem inflatable, borrowed a paddle, got the wallet back thanks to the honesty of strangers... it all worked out. The cottonwoods were brilliant yellow, the beaches were empty, the sun warm, and the nights cool. A handful of rafters came down from Desolation but it was otherwise empty. Sad to see summer go. Oh yeah, and I forgot the pan to cook dinner in. :-)

MAPLE CANYON EXPLORATION

HIKERS: Cory, Kim, Phoebe

TRAIL: view point, slot canyon, and pipe dream

NOTES: Maple canyon is our oasis in the desert. Who would ever guess that a fern could grow in the wild in our climate, but it is true and we saw them today. I have hiked this trail before, but we took the 'road less traveled' a couple of times and were greatly rewarded by amazing scenery. The colors are so gorgeous right now I was mentally kicking myself the whole time that I didn't have my camera. We also found a huge cavern called 'pipe dreams' that has bolts all over the ceiling for climbers. I am so disappointed there weren't any climbers on one of the routes. It would be an amazing thing to see. They would have to be defying gravity! All in all- perfect weather, perfect scenery and perfect trails. After Phoebe quit bawling the company wasn't too bad either. : )

BACKBONE REVISITED

HIKERS: Amy, Kim

TIME: Approx. 9:30- 10:40 am

TEMP: Little chilly to begin with, but perfect after we got going.

NOTES: We haven't hiked in a while and it felt like visiting an old friend. We didn't do too bad for just eating a big breakfast right before either. Hiking in the fall is the best! Cool, crisp weather, beautiful colors and mud caking your shoes. Ah, perfect...

RAGNAR LAS VEGAS

Attempting to spell RAGNAR

DATES: October 8-9, Friday & Saturday
TEAM: Mighty Mandelbaums #37 (aka Mighty Muffin Tops)
RUNNERS: Van 1: Amy, Tracy, Jason, Kristi, Joe, Hillary, Van 2: Jaren, Doug, Michelle, Brad, Roger, Tracy
START TIME: Oct 8, 9:00 am
FINISH TIME: Oct 9, 12:30 pm
LEG 6: Valley of Fire, 5.3 miles, Hard, 90 F, mid afternoon, 62 min
LEG 18: Lake Mead Trail, 5.4 miles, Hard, 58 F, midnight, 67 min
LEG 30: Vegas Suburbs, 2.9 miles, Easy, 60 F, early morning, 32 min

AMY'S NOTES: 171 miles. The first 12 hours of the race were pretty great. You run your first leg, support everyone else running their first leg. Carry water, spray your teammates down, spray strangers down, crack jokes, cheer for other runners, keep a running tally of all the honey pot stops, and generally have a good time. The next 12 hours are a little more interesting. Your normal bedtime hour comes and goes, the honey pots take on a certain rankness, the temperatures cool, people's eyes start to glaze, night settles in on the course, runners pass as bobbing flashing lights on the asphalt, and the legs become a journey of solitude through an unfamiliar desert landscape with only a few feet of headlamp illuminating the way. The final hours are another story entirely - it's more like survival mode. On my third leg, shortly after dawn, I joined the "god job, keep it up" club. I stopped counting after the 10th time and started laughing after each proclamation of encouragement. You have to look pretty miserable for perfect strangers to be repeatedly telling you "good job, keep it up." Not the fastest times in the world, but I ran the whole way despite being ridiculously sick all week long, and I'm shamelessly proud of myself.

To see several ridiculous videos of the adventure go to: http://www.youtube.com/remoteindustry

BALD MOUNTAIN IN THE MOONLIGHT

HIKERS: Kim, Phoebe

TEMP: 45 f

TIME: 8:30 pm

NOTES: Very fun little hike with my 6 year old daughter. We just went as far as she could (about half way to the screen) and then we stopped and had a little snack. She had a blast looking at all the lights of the town and all the stars. We had a great time!

TWIN PEAKS SUMMIT!

The trail forks at this lake.

Justin coming up through the gap.

Dave working his way along the ridge.

Dave, Amy & Justin on the summit!

Manly men.

Before sunrise at the spot where we turned around the first time.

HIKERS: Amy, Dave, Justin
START TIME: 6:15 am
RT TIME: 9.5 hours
SUMMIT TIME: 5 hours
SUMMIT ELEVATION: 11,330 ft
ELEVATION GAIN: 5100 ft
TRAILHEAD: Broadsfork TH, Big Cottonwood Canyon
WEATHER: Sunny, clear


AMY'S NOTES: Third time is the charm. We finally made it and with the core group we started with - the stalwarts. The weather was beautiful and I was in the company of two really great guys. A cold front and storm moved in on the Wednesday afterwards and the mountains have been covered in snow since. And strangely, I actually love that it took us 3 attempts to summit - it became the epic of the summer. With every attempt the jokes became funnier and the adventure more grand. This time we took the left fork at the lake and were able to follow a well traveled trail into the next colouir where the trail peters out and you need to pick your way up the scree and talus slope. It's at this point that you can see one of the twin peaks in the foreground. On this last section, after splitting up and trying different routes, we found it easiest to stay left and aim for the gap (or slot) along the ridge. We then picked our way along the ridge to the summit. This seemed a better route than taking the "trail" that snakes along the base of the ridge. We spent about 45 minutes on the summit enjoying the views of Little Cottonwood, Big Cottonwood, Timpanogos, Nebo, Alta, Snowbird, Red Pine, White Pine, Salt Lake Valley, and Mt Olympus - the mountain that started it all. Ended the day in tradition with a big meal at Porcupines. Loved this climb.

"Broads Fork Twin Peaks, more frequently referred to simply as "Twin Peaks", is the highest and most prominent mountain on the eastern skyline behind Salt Lake Valley. With an elevation of 11,330 feet (east summit) and 11,328 feet (west summit), the Twins rise nearly 7,000 vertical feet above the valley floor. The most commonly used ascent route is via Broads Fork, a class 3 climb of 5,100+ vertical feet with some scrambling and exposure. The center of the Twin Peaks Wilderness Area, the peaks here are some of the most rugged to be found in the Wasatch." -SummitPost.org