nat’l-park

Badlands National Park

Published June 28, 2019

Kicked off June in Deadwood, ending in Sturgis. South Dakota bookends – with a HUGE Bighorn chapter in-between. Black Hills tomorrow will DOUBLE my lifetime ultra tally. Six 50k finishes in 6 months (with two late-year treks to go). Whole lotta trail, lotta new adventure.

2019 2^nd Half – back to Canada. Saskatchewan, Montreal and Yellowknife. Family RUN-cations booked in Iceland & Austria. 7^th continent reality over Thanksgiving break. Blessed life.

Friday puddle-jumper to Rapid City, half-day hike before shuteye.

Welcome to the Badlands. Rushmore, Crazy Horse, Wind Cave, Custer State Park, even the Corn Palace. South Dakota three times – but never ever Badlands. ‘Til today.

Hour-half ride to Interior in a tricked-out F150. Nice ride. Boys & trucks.

Summer HEAT. Following 6 weeks of climate-change monsoons, even the Badlands was flower blooming. Ranger recommendation? Notch Trail. Rock walls, fields of YELLOW. Easy 2-mile hike & rope stairs UP. Allows ya to hike the canyon rim. FAAANNNNTASTIC! Sign me up!

Desert hike. Desert heat. And a view you’ll long remember ❤️

Badlands National Park – add to the list, HIGHLY recommended. WOW’d.

: Badlands WELCOME

: Ben Reifel Visitor Center

: Cliff Shelf Nature Trail

: desert OASIS

: Badlands BLOOM

: SNAKES 🐍

Notch Trail (Badlands Nat’l Park)

: RANGER recommend

: long way DOWN

: Notch Trail

: desert DAY HIKE

: rope ladder UP

: ‘the Notch’

: Canyon Rim trek

: view I’ll remember

: 93 degrees HOT

Badlands National Park

Posted in Heartland | Tagged hiking, nat'l-park, road-signs | Leave a comment

Torres del Paine

Published January 17, 2019

After a crazy night of questionable life choices, woke to a BANG.

rap, RAP, Rap. Hotel door. Up, spinning, WALL, bed. Where am I?! rap, RAP, Rap. Focus. Diego de Almagro. Punta Arenas. I’ve got this. Back in Chile.

Conversation: Bus is leaving in 15 minutes. I don’t feel well, think I’m skipping today’s trip. You can sleep on the bus. Ugh. Ok, ok. 15 minutes. I’ll be there.

Change of clothes. Sip of juice. Teeth brushed. On the bus.

Conversation: How do you feel? Green 🤢

Bus stop. AMAZING what 3 hours sleep can do. Splashed water on my face. NEW day. Puerto Natales, border town between Chile & Argentina. COKE Sabor purchase. Thanks Katya. Would’ve LIFE MISSED Torres del Paine without ya. Road trip!

Landscape reminiscent of HOME.

Prairie grasses, MASSIVE PEAKS jutting STRAIGHT UP — an oil painting of colour. Turquoise water, snow-capped peaks. Colorado HOME…well, almost. Except for the guanacos, Chile’s native llama variety 🦙

Murky grey Laguna Amarga, 10 minutes more. Silt-fed glacier water. 180-degree turn.

pull over, PULL OVER. GUANACOS. Native, unafraid, running wild amongst us. On the lake? FLAMINGOS. FOREVER memory/life imprint. Photo FLOOD. I was here.

Parque Nacional Torres del Paine. Entrance selfie, day pass purchased, passport stamped. Each bus stop progressive/building on the last/memory upon memory. Another peak, more glacier-fed waters. Salto Grando trail, Mirador los Cuernos. Thunderous waterfall, wind whipping off the MONSTER WALL above. YES, YES, YES!

GROUP pic time. Complete strangers a week ago. Different countries/language/age. Marathon brothers/sisters, ALL Antarctica adventurers. I heart my new RUN FAMILY.

Day trip in South America’s Andes Mountains.

HOME from HOME, my mountain soul fed ❤️

: first LOOK

: South America’s ANDES

: turquoise BLUE

: Laguna Amarga

: GUANACO 🦙

: Chilean llama

: FLAMINGO

: FOREVER memory

: Parque Nacional

: Cerro Paine Grande

: Salto Grande

: Cuernos del Paine (Norte, Principal, Este & Fortaleza)

: breezy STRONG

: adventurer RUN FAMILY

: mountain soul fed ❤️

Torres del Paine

Posted in Americas | Tagged nat'l-park, rivers-lakes, waterfalls, wildlife | Leave a comment

Geyser Day 2018

Published July 21, 2018

Geyser Day 2018, Montana Take 2.

Paid registration for Sunday’s marathon once before. 2016 was a marathon no-show. Whole lotta puking that summer/didn’t stop a family vacation with Ash & Tom though. Rode horses in the Tetons, bear watched in West Yellowstone, geyser-gazed for 2 days in USA’s first National Park. Ever dependable Old Faithful: filmed its eruption, ate lunch in the Lodge. AWESOME LIFE memories.

Fast forward two years. No cancer, no 10-hour monster ride to Wyoming. Hour-15 direct flight to Bozeman. Marathon Eve plans? Yellowstone NEW. Whole section of geysers never seen on the Montana border. Same GREAT Park, NEW life adventure 😊

7am wakeup, FREE hotel breakfast, MT Highway 89 South to Gardiner. Crossed under Roosevelt Arch, Yellowstone’s North Entrance. Dedicated in 1903, this was the Park’s origin – directly across from Fort Yellowstone, established to protect the Park. Quick stop at Albright Visitor Center (ya’ll know I dig museums), then moved the rental forward another half-mile to Mammoth Hot Springs.

How have I NEVER visited Mammoth Hot Springs before? WOW, WOW, WOW! 2 mile hike-about. Naturally-formed terraces of crystallized calcium carbonate. Reminiscent of Death Valley’s salt flats. Walked the perimeter to Canary Springs before looping back.

Time check: 3 hours. Old Faithful & Grand Prismatic Spring, tops on my list.

Walked right up & watched Old Faithful spew. Not the front row seat I secured 2 years ago – but the timing, mighty perfect. Ya can’t visit Yellowstone & skip the Main Event, duh. Gotta/hafta/must experience EVERY time. Remarkable force of nature.

‘BEST of’ finale: Grand Prismatic Spring, an eye candy WOWser & my Park personal fave. “Named for its striking coloration, the Spring’s colors match the rainbow dispersion of white light: red, orange, yellow, green, and blue.” It’s a CAN’T miss.

Yellowstone 2018. No regrets; saw something old, saw something new. LOVE LOVE our National Parks ❤️

Drive to Ennis — spotted a BRAND NEW Visitors’ Center (Gallatin County MT). Earthquake Lake. Unplanned stop/didn’t know its story. Trees & rock from the seismic mountain collapse (blocking the Madison River/forming Earthquake Lake), creepily still crest water’s edge, stand trapped/barren/dead today. Well done retelling of events (actual pics & video).

Lodge check-in, early sleeps. Marathon eve. School bus road-trippin’ in the morning 🚌

Story of Earthquake Lake

It was near midnight on August 17th, 1959 when an earthquake near the Madison River triggered a massive landslide. The slide moved at 100 mph and in less than 1 minute, over 80 million tons of rock crashed into the narrow canyon, blocking the Madison River and forming Earthquake Lake. This earth- changing event, known as the Hebgen Lake Earthquake, measured 7.5 on the Richter scale. At the time it was the second largest earthquake to occur in the lower 48 states in the 20th century. Twenty-eight people lost their lives in the event.