skhill, that's awesome! At the end of the year last year, I tried to figure out where I could have run to if I'd done all the yearly miles in one shot. I would have made it to somewhere on the coast of BC (I picked that direction because I was having this conversation with a friend who lives in Victoria). Where would your 5000 take you?
RnR, I love days like that. Makes you think "Huh. Maybe it's not all that bad!"
Yes, I wiped out. I have been falling a lot this year, enough that I am wondering if my proprioception is off somehow. My shoulder is mostly OK; it's just sore now (and I can't lie on that side). No backpacking for a while, I'm afraid.
I had a frustrating but good run in the mountains yesterday (I was going to go today but the weather forecast for today was 50% chance of rain and lightning--uh, no). I didn't choose the best trail: I chose one that is really, really rocky and tough to run with any steadiness--this was the frustrating part. I ended up hiking a lot, but that's OK. It was a good adventure in the wilderness and I had good weather. High point was a pass called Rocky Sea at ~11,300' and low point was 9,810', so it was all pretty high. Bonus was that there were lots of friendly folks out and I saw lots of pikas and pine grosbeaks. I had no idea how far my planned route would be, but I figured between 20 and 30 miles. It ended up being about 27.5 miles. Most of my photos didn't turn out well because the air is kind of smoky from all the fires in the region, but I've attached a few. The rocky photo (the first one) is what I would call "average" rockiness for this trail. Some parts were better and some were much worse. The other photos are the pass from the east side as I was headed back up (I went up and over and then ran around the basin on that side and then back over again), a bridge through a meadow (see all our beetle-killed trees? ), and the pass in the distance, from the highway as I was leaving. I did fall once (well, of course!), but it wasn't too bad. No blood and I managed to avoid hitting my bad shoulder.
I ran about 7.5 miles this AM with DH. The first mile or so was tough (skyrocketing heartrate!) but then I felt pretty good. It helps that we were going realllllllly slow
Happy running, everyone!