To Fernie and Beyond
When we last left our protagonist (that's me) he was leaving a job after 15 years, moving to the mountains, and headed to Edmonton for the Iron Horse Ultra. Catch up here. I may write about that at a later date, but that date is not today. Suffice to say it didn't go well.
Which brings me to today. We now live 'Fernie Adjacent' in a town called Sparwood. We bought a modular home..in a park..in cash, so we wouldn't have the constraints of a large mortgage, and could enjoy going to the mountains on our days off.
We have made good use of our time.
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| Harshan and Pru |
Mount Hosmer, where I met them my second day in the area, at 7am. We drove on some old windy roads to the trailhead, doing the usual 'get to know you before we climb a mountain together' thing. We climb an unrelenting slope for a couple of hours, basically helping me get oriented to the area. Fernie is kind of awesome. The trail breaks the treeline, and we summit onto a ridge with pretty darn amazing views. This post should basically be a photo album.
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| Hosmer Views |
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| My ugly mug/poor attempt at a selfie |
I've included a few pictures here, keep in mind that our movers had not delivered our stuff yet, and I was stuck wearing my gear/extra clothes from the Iron Horse ultra where it was 20 degrees warmer. My take away from the run up and down Hosmer, is that Harshan is kind of crazy (in a good way), and Pru keeps him from doing anything REALLY crazy (I wonder if this guy would get along with my buddy up north Shayne (my running buddy from previous posts)). All in all, pretty darn amazing!
After running with these two, my wife had to meet them, so the next day we did another gooder, up Mount Fernie. Harshan knows all the mount bike trails around the mountain. He says he doesn't mountain bike, but given his knowledge base of the trail system, I wouldn't be surprised if he has a bike in a storage locker somewhere that he uses to keep his dark love of mountain biking secret.
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| the 'unmaintained trail' |
I've been in the area 4 days, and bagged 2 peaks.
Not too shaby.
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| Castle Mountain Trail |
Today, we had snow. Fernie is famous for it, so I shouldn't be surprised. Harshan had some back country death run planned, but he came up with this one last minute due to the snow, and Bonnie and I agreed to try it out (we aren't that smart either).
7am rolls around, and Harshan and Pru take us on more mountain bike trails to the summit of Castle Mountain (I'm even more sure he's a secret mountain biker now!). This place is pretty amazing, and I've got all the routes and elevations on Strava, if you're a route geek like me.
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| That sunrise |
After we finish our 13.7mile run up and around Castle Mountain, we head home, with plans for a 26.5mile 'Trails to Ales' run next Sunday. I'll be more in depth next week, but this week is still happening!
When I get home, I have plans to run with Stephanie and her son Baden in Sparwood. They are new to the area as well, and don't know many of the trails. Stephanie has solo completed the Sinister 7 100miler in 2015, so I look forward to picking her brain. and showing her some of my super vanilla training trails. The MLS trail (4k loop) fits the bill, and we do 2 loops of the trail with good conversation. I've never met a trail runner I didn't get along with. I look forward to future adventures! This brings me to 90miles of running this week. I can't complain.
So there you have it! Not my most inspired piece, but I had a lot to put down.
My life lesson so far has been to not overlook a single opportunity to meet people. You never know when you will meet a person that will play an integral role in your journey.
More to come next week. Sorry for the long post, it took a while to put words to these weeks after my last post.
Crush your Goals,
The Canadian Ghost Runner
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