Ice Cloud Run

In early January I traveled to North Carolina again, making the usual ascent of Mt. Sterling upon my early morning arrival after driving through the night from West Lafayette. That climb was followed with visits to hot spots in Asheville, the Blue Ridge Parkway, and some of my favorite trails in the area.

Have you ever wondered what it is like to climb up through clouds? Perhaps you have done that. Have you ever wondered what it is like to pass through clouds just after a precipitous temperature drop? If you have done that, then you are familiar with hoar frost and rime ice. I experienced both, but mostly rime ice.

Hoar frost forms when humidity in the air forms loose, snowlike ice crystals on the ground and flora after they cool below the freezing temperature. Rime ice forms when larger wind-blown water droplets in fog or clouds freeze onto ground coverings. The rime ice I encountered was dense and smooth, but some rime ice can be feathery like hoar frost. Regardless of the ice type, it created an aesthetic and occasionally transfixing scene.

It is worth noting that the temperature was 19F at the Baxter Creek Trailhead and -2F at the Mt. Sterling summit. The wind purred at 11 mph near the trailhead and blasted along at 44-59 mph on the summit - that's a -40 wind chill! (I have a Kestrel 4000 weather instrument, which is cool because I also have a Kestrel 4000 bike :)

Yes, it was incredibly fun, cold, slippery, and lonely. I did not encounter anyone along the trail. I wonder why?

Anyway, the run itself was encumbered by the ice and more than a dozen trees that had fallen along or across the trail. I mention those conditions because they are my excuses for having recorded my slowest round trip up and down the mountain. I have chosen to ignore the fact that a four month sciatic pinch left me the least fit I've ever been when attempting that tough 20K run.

Here are some of the photos I snapped before both batteries and all ten digits refused to work. Click on them to expand the view and create a slide show. Enjoy!

Entering the clouds.

Two huge blowdowns. Those trunks have
more than three foot diameter.

View from the tower. Mt. Mitchell is center.

This tree fell directly along the trail,
making it easier to negotiate than most.

Backwoods paparazzi shot

Just had to sit on top of the tunnel.

Closed BRP good for running and exploring.

Barefoot run on a frozen timber guardrail.

Euclidean Snow Run

In the wee hours of December 26th a winter storm, dubbed Euclid, blasted its way through Southern Indiana on its way from the Gulf to the Northeast. It bore copious quantities of moisture that came as rain, ice, and snow. Just to the east and south of us the storm produced high winds, lightning, and threats of tornados - typical spring weather. That was where the warmer air prevailed.

Having gone to bed on Christmas with a light breeze as the only evidence of Euclid's existence, we were awakened just before dawn by howling winds and thundersnow. Thundersnow is eery. We are conditioned to hear almost nothing during a snow storm because snow quietly, almost politely, piles up while disrupting sound waves from surrounding sources.

The thundersnow I've encountered seems like a muffled, long lasting version of regular thunder. It is similar to normal thunder in that it is the sound of lightning occurring due to friction during the violent upheaval of warm air by cold and more dense air that quickly wedges its way under the warm air.

Euclid moved in quickly, producing lots of lightning and 40+ mph wind gusts. That wind created whiteout conditions for a couple of hours while Euclid laid down 6-18 inches of snow.

I will resist delving into our municipality's inability to handle such a snowfall, except for mentioning that most roads were impassible (and probably still are!).

Map from my awesome new Polar RC3 GPS!

So, on the 26th and 27th I miraculously found my way to USI where I ran through the woods on the USI campus and at Burdette Park. (The map only shows Greenway running, because I want people in those houses along the edges of the forests to keep believing in Sasquatch:) Though those who know me well will not believe it, I can proudly pass on that I only fell once in the snow. Of course, I fell hard in the parking lot before my run on Christmas morning.

No one else was there, so the only footprints were mine and those of the fauna. I carried a camera on the second and third runs. What follows are some of the photos I took as I plodded along the Greenway and several single track trails. Though I have run there thousands of times during the last three decades, I can only remember a couple of events that were as adventurous, invigorating, and eye pleasing.  Enjoy!

Trackless Greenway . . .

. . . bunny tracked Greenway

Love the windblown look, Mother Nature!

I wonder if his tootsies were cold . . .

Hated when they built that damned dam, but it is growing on me.

Alone :)

Not alone.

This made the tootsies cold!

Amen.

Fall Fire in the Smokies

Here are a few of the photos from a short mid-October trip to the mountains of North Carolina to view Fall colors. Fall in the Great Smokies means tranquil frost lined mornings that melt into diversely brilliant Fall foliage and that unmistakable misty sky.

The timing of this trip meant that the best color displays were seen above four thousand feet. It was at those higher altitudes that rustling mixtures of yellow maple and poplar leaves, red maple and sourwood leaves, and rusty browns of oak and sycamore leaves combined to create a fire-like effect that changed dramatically in hue as the illuminating sun moved across the sky.

Seeing, feeling, smelling, and hearing those magnificent mountains in the Fall allows me to recall the many trips I took with my sons as they grew from toddlers to teens. Those valuable memories, each and every one, add to the alluring aesthetics of the Smokies. Enjoy!

First stop produced a slow run up Mt. Sterling.

Looking north toward Bristol, TN

"I'll take your picture," he said.
"You'll want people to know how much this run hurt," he laughed

"Hey, are you that physics teacher from Indiana?"

Along the Blue Ridge Parkway

Green Knob - overgrown overlook on the Knob

Don't these happen too fast?

Grandfather Mountain, NC

Sightseeing at 45 mph on a bike . . .