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<p>I hear ya! Those things wore me out, too.</p>
<p>idad- your hike was way more technically difficult than mine. That stone to stone stepping looks very challenging. Congratulations on your adventure.</p>
<p>CJANE:</p>
<p>Yeah. I was stunned when you said you did 7 miles in 3 hours, so I found some YouTubes of your hike. The trails are completely different. Smooth dirt trails are few and far between around here. Everything is eroded down to rocks. Must be different geology…</p>
<p>Your hike looks just breathtaking. Nothing like that terrain on the east coast.</p>
<p>The only time we have hiking on smooth trails is in the snow. The real penalty is downhill. The ascent is so cardio limited that stepping from rock to rock probably doesn’t much matter, but if you start booking along downhill, you are asking for a twisted ankle and a tumble.</p>
<p>As I do more of it, I’ve decided that it’s easier to step from rock to rock to rock like stepping stones than to step on the dirt between rocks.</p>
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<p>Here’s my [roughing</a> it by a stream](<a href=“- YouTube”>- YouTube) campsite. Photos taken very early this morning while water was boiling for coffee. I’m not exactly suffering. Queen size air mattress with both layers of queen size sleeping bag for a mattress topper. Then, a fleece liner bag, a down bag, and two down pillows… As long as it’s not raining, it’s actually quite nice. Burbling brook is a constant backdrop.</p>
<p>Armchair travel with modern technology has never been better. 
Thanks.</p>
<p>Do you have a favorite season for hiking now, iDad?</p>
<p>Jeez, idad, you should come out here on a hiking trip. Trails are very plentiful and not full of rocks. That seems very difficult to do, walking over rocks. Roughing it by a stream, seriously, that looks luxurious!</p>
<p>I’m hoping we can do St Helens and Cascade Pass in the next month or two, just spectacular hikes. Cascade Pass makes you feel like you’re in the Sound of Music, without the Nazis chasing you, of course. Then again, I might preferred distant Nazis to the black flies we had last time.</p>
<p>Winter hiking is by far the easiest around here. All the rocks are buried, so it’s smooth footing. I’ve got photos of the same signpost at Lonesome Lake and there had to be five or six feet of snow in the winter. </p>
<p>Of course, the cold temps, the potentially serious weather, and sunset at 4:30 pm limit the options to short, easy hikes.</p>
<p>Bus, Bus, Bus, what are we going to do with you? The real question: are the flies doing anything dirty?</p>
<p>Okay, I’m headed off to sleep now.</p>
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<p>I should come hiking. Looking up the photos of Jane’s trails, I’m definitely jealous.</p>
<p>I think New England is a little unique because it was all scraped by glaciers which deposited a thick layer of rocks. As people have hiked the trails (for 200 years on the one I hiked this week), the soil erodes, leaving trenches of roots and rock. The only easy walking is when it’s on actual slabs of granite.</p>
<p>Some of the footing is man-made. It is very common to see rough stairways made from placed boulders on the steep bit. The learning curve is trying to be smooth and fluid walking on the rocks. It takes looking two or three steps ahead and seeing what rock you want to end up on.</p>
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<p>The big tarp for camping is a bit of overkill, but I learned the hard way that it is utterly miserable if it’s raining in the morning and you have no dry place to stand outside the tent. It’s worth the time to put the tarp up.</p>
<p>Oh Deborah, you’re killing me. That is the first time I’ve laughed all day (packing the kiddo to go far, far away tomorrow. It’s so sad). I’m guessing they must have been doing something dirty, because there so many they must have been seriously reproducing!</p>
<p>Well that does sound like some challenging hiking, idad. I wonder if it is more stress on your knees to go further with the type of easy hiking we have, or shorter with the challenging rock stepping that you are doing. It does seem that you might be using more muscles than we do.</p>
<p>Idad, welcome back. I may get a shot at rocky terrane this month out in Newfoundland. Hiking takes on a whole new dimension there But with mch in tow, its hard to say whether our hosts will have hiking on the menu or not. It’s something the girls usually do together. I am legendary for my tendency to hold onto trees and cling to rock walls given the vertigo-inducing heights some of those craiggy trails run along. My friends have a hilarious series of photos covering five miles of such “clingon” action from my last visit :)</p>
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<p>iDad, my husband nods his head in agreement on this one. He commented that in the days of tube tents they also helped prevent raining on the inside of the tent from condensation.</p>
<p>Let us know when you’re coming to town. We’d like to take you out to dinner.</p>
<p>Love the YouTubes and the hike. The rocks would send my flying- no doubt in my mind. It looks just gorgeous.</p>
<p>I’m feeling tired and sluggish- combo of days getting shorter and some bad eating. Not to mention the anticipation of a hot, humid marathon on Sunday. Got out the door this morning for 2.6 miles which isn’t a glorious start to August, but I’m trying to rest up for this endeavor on Sunday.</p>
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I think it is more of a workout going up on the rocks, because you often have to take large steps up that really work the legs. And balancing is a lot tougher.</p>
<p>Going down… for me it is painful on both rocks and smooth paths. When I saw that picture from Jane of the 4900 vertical, my knees started crying. A mere 1800 foot vertical in Maine left my knees painfully sore for 4 days.</p>
<p>I don’t think I could do Jane’s 7 miles in 3 hours with 2100 feet vertical, even if it were on a paved sidewalk. The Empire State building is only 1400 feet vertical and that uphill is a workout no matter what the footing is like.</p>
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<p>No question about that. The step-ups from the floor to my weight bench are the exercise that pays off on uphill. Single leg squats help with the downhill.</p>
<p>The hiking poles make a huge difference, taking just a bit of a load off the legs. And, they save me from a fall several times each hike as a little foot slip doesn’t mean a tumble if the pole is firmly planted. I shorten them up for climbing and make them really long for downhill, so I can plant the poles before big step downs.</p>
<p>I’m learning to use the rocks to my advantage – finding a little intermediate rock to step on to lessen the height of the big rock step next to it. That’s how every time out gets me a little closer to be fluid and efficient.</p>
<p>I actually have to force myself to not charge ahead when there is a smooth bit of trail. It’s just a refreshing change that the tendency is to bolt ahead. But, I don’t have the cardio for the “hare” approach to these climbs, so I’m better off using the smooth bits as a breather. Gotta keep the legs from burning on the uphill, because that’s a sure sign of unsustainable pace. As much as I love interval training, you can’t do that for hours! I had to laugh yesterday. A couple of young guys, not in very good shape would go racing past me on the way up. Then, I’d mosey along and find them sitting on the trail. Then, they’d race past me, and stop again.</p>
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<p>I did a little of that. I did a loop from the summit of Pierce down to the AMC Mizpah hut. That section of the Appalachian Trail has [a</a> notoriously steep section](<a href=“Michael’s NH and VT Hiking”>Michael’s NH and VT Hiking) where grabbing a sapling next to the trail on the way down is the best approach! These are some well-worn trees from years of hugging!</p>
<p>We did a 2 mile hike in 2 hours in Israel…with a 3 1/2 year old. He was the champion at going up rocks on all fours! We let him go first cause obviously he was setting the pace. :D</p>
<p>I have no idea how much elevation was lost/gained on the hike, but it was pretty strenuous. Think going up and down hills in San Francisco, only it’s rocks about half of the time. Even many of the level bits were rocks, as in dry wadis.</p>
<p>I can imagine a 7 mile hike would have taken us…7 hours.</p>
<p>Idad, you are definitely due for a trip to our neck to the woods 
Hiking here is spectacular. As far as camping goes, you would definitely need a tarp:</p>
<p>[Blue</a> Tarp Camper - YouTube](<a href=“- YouTube”>- YouTube)</p>
<p>:)</p>
<p>Ha. Ha. Love the Blue Tarp Camper!</p>
<p>I got a brief rain shower hiking to find the Keeper of Stray Ladies on the first afternoon. Had to put on the rain jacket because it looked like it might really let loose, but it passed quickly. Still pretty damp the first night. Clear and dry after that.</p>
<p>Okay down another 3lbs so a total of 10 since I started- does that count as my second 5lb loss or since I was down 7 at my last weigh in do I have to be down 5 from that?</p>
<p>All diet since Tuesday slight medical inconvenience will limit workouts for a few days. Nothing serious.
Since I can not work out I tried reduced carbs on Wednesday and it worked.</p>
<p>I do miss working out though.</p>
<p>Tom - you set the rules! Any reason for a 5 lb party is good.</p>
<p>MOWC - you ever try massage 4-5 days before a race? I think it helped me.</p>