Billy Goat Trail 2019

Last month I hiked the Billy Goat Trail, sort of, with a friend as we have done fortthe past two decades. This year marked the end of the annual hike, for me at least, as my subtle yet real vision deterioration following my four eye surgeries last year preclude me any more from scrambling atop the many jagged rock edges along the boulder fields which intermittently make up the 3-mile rugged, rocky trail.  It immediately became apparent to me that there was too much risk now of a stumbling mis-step on such tricky terrain, with undoubted disastrous consequences. Time passes and things change. So we retired to the C&O Canal Towpath and had a nice 4-mile walk.

We encountered wildlife along the way, turtles in the water and a preying mantis underfoot (which we shooed off the trail).  The view from the overlook gave us dizzying views of roaring, rushing water underneath the bridge to the viewing point.

I always love the reflections that play along the still waters of the canal.  Off the trail down by the backwater channels of the Potomac are little sandy beaches with wading pools where tourists sometimes swim but it is illegal and dangerous, with a prohibitive risk of death by being swept away.

At the conclusion of three enjoyable hours spent perambulating the towpath, we retired from the park till next year.

 

Along the C&O Canal Towpath

Although our scramble over the rough Billy Goat Trail during the weekend had been cut short by my friend's shoe falling apart, thus introducing unacceptable, albeit remote, risk on parts of the trail involving rock-face traverses along high points with drop-offs below in case the shoe caught or failed completely, we had a nice stroll along the C&O Canal towpath.  I enjoyed watching reflections cast upon the still canal water by clouds overhead, the rocky shoreline and foliage in the background.

There was also wildlife around us.  I snapped a picture of a crane perched upon a log by the far shore.

We walked over to Virginia from Maryland in achieving the river overlook point just off the towpath.  The river was flowing fast and frothy as seen from Olmstead Island, which is Virginia soil although separated from the Old Dominion by the rushing river.

Our three-hour traipse done, we noticed an interesting, working relic from the past along the way by the park entrance.  I haven't seen one in years, although they used to be common everywhere.

Billy Goat Trail 2018.

A friend and I went to the C&O Canal National Park recently to perambulate the Billy Goat Trail, a 3-mile rocky trail in Maryland alongside the Potomac River that involves scrambling over rocky promontories overlooking the river and traversing boulder-strewn granite outcrops that make up a large part of the trail.  While not considered a difficult trail, it does necessitate maintaining balance at high points and footing and hand grips along rock faces.

We went clockwise this year, traveling the most difficult part first, having went counterclockwise last year.  We went down the rocky valley, crossed over the first stream by going from rock to rock in the stream bed and crossed over the bridge spanning the second stream.  Thence started the climb up rock slopes to eventually arrive at high overlook points along the far-below river.

But disaster struck, as my friend's shoe came apart from the stress of rock climbing and the sole separated from the shoe.  It was unsafe at that point to go the entire distance with a floppy shoe which could catch in any rock crevice along the way and cause her to lose her balance, perhaps at a perilous point.

So we egressed the trail at the halfway point on a short exit trail to the canal towpath.  The mile and a half of rough trail we had gone had tired us anyway and we enjoyed a less stressful walk back to my vehicle, spotting some wildlife along the way including deer, cranes or pelicans, turtles and frogs.

Get it while you can, if you can

The greatest bargain for anyone 62 or older is a National Parks Pass allowing its recipient and a guest or guests into any National Park for free for life, for a one-time purchase price of $10.  For instance, purchase one at the C&O Canal Towpath parking lodgment for the Billy Goat Trail in MD and you will be able to pre-pay for the parking fee and individual entrance (both free thereafter) for the $10 card, which will save you money for that trip on the spot.

I received a card at my retirement party when I was retired from my agency last year after a quarter-center of service.  I value the card more highly than I do the small statue I received of the agency's distinctive statue outside its entrance, which I also like for memory's sake.

This card has a lot of utility.  Visit the second most spectacular site in the US that I have seen, Crater Lake in OR, for free.

Or visit the most spectacular site in the US that I have seen, the Grand Canyon, with the card.  But the price for the bargain is going up eight-fold soon, so act now if you are eligible.

Birthday

I spent a nice birthday earlier having lunch with a friend and then hiking along the C&O Canal Towpath.  It gave me an opportunity to practice with my new camera.

I have run through the little 8-page set-up guide that came with the Canon, so next I have to print off the 180 page manual and refer to it.  My friends say to just refer to it on line, but, well, it's not written that well and to refer to it and apply whatever it says to the camera, I have to have the instructions  open in front of me.

The camera has a 40X zoom which brings things incredibly close but it's tricky to use because it's hard to find the subject in the field as the initial blurriness of the focus clears, and then hold the camera steady enough to get a clear picture at that magnification.  The slightest tremor or most minor tremble throws off the field or blurs the picture, so I have to practice this feature.

But I am pleased with the new camera and it takes pictures with close detail and vivid colors.  I spent an enjoyable birthday.

It's a new year...

… so it's time to update my profile picture.  The last one was from the noon hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month of 2015.

The new one is from July 9th of last year, when I spent an enjoyable afternoon bicycling on the C&O Canal Towpath with a friend.

Here is another view of that day.

And one more.

The C&O

The C&O Canal Towpath is a pretty active place year round, especially in the summer.  They currently have a program at the National Park entrance that offers anyone a free bike loaner for two hours with which to enjoy the trail.

You can step back into yesteryear and ride a canal passenger boat, hauled up canal by mules.

There's camping and fishing.

There's running and of course hiking as well.  It's a well maintained national treasure that runs from the District all the way up into West Virginia.

Billy Goat Trail 2014 Version

Every year I hike the Billy Goat Trail along the Potomac River on the Maryland side, usually with a friend.  The trail is a moderately difficult 3-mile scramble over rocks, up boulder fields and around tree roots.

This year I did it in the fall, which is late for me, as I usually do it in the summer.  But with so many of the leaves blown off the trees by the lateness of the season, I enjoyed better vistas of the river from the trail, which runs through wooded land for the most part.

There are spots where the trail comes out upon sheer precipices overlooking the river.  Also long rock crevices on cliff faces you have to traverse.

If you're not somewhat fit the trail won't be an enjoyable experience.  But completing the trek does give one a certain measure of satisfaction, given its moderate difficulty.

The 16 ouncer

I ran 10K on the C&O Canal Towpath yesterday in 60:54, jumping in with my friend Ashley while she did 14 miles getting ready for the MCM in October. For the first time in a long time the running came easy, just like in the olden days, abetted by the company of a good friend and the forgiving surface of the towpath.

When I let go of Ashley after five miles to return to my car while she finished her much longer run, I even practiced picking people off the last mile. Team in Training was out there ahead of me and the last quarter mile I ran hard to overtake three runners who were a hundred yards ahead of me. It was fun and I felt good.

Then I went to the Steak 'N Egg Kitchen on Wisconsin Avenue for an artery-clogging breakfast, ordering the Old South Sunday, a meal of biscuits & gravy, 2 eggs, hash browns, bacon and sausage (but I eschewed the extra cheese). While I ate I marveled at the clockwork-like efficiency of the eight persons working in the narrow space behind the counter, three cooking on the grill, three more waiting on the counter diners, and one worker each busing and dish washing. A ninth person handled the outside patio from the other side of the counter and she obviously knew everything that was going on with all the orders.

One patron ordered a T-bone steak with his eggs and seemed disappointed when the steaming meat slab with juices dripping off it was put in front of him. "Is this 16 ounces?" he asked. When assured that it was, he proceeded to eat it with relish. The place was packed and it never closes.

The Billy Goat Trail

Recovering from my last marathon a week ago has been interesting--on Tuesday I tried to run a mile but found it hurt too much and I quit after a block. Wednesday I limped home for a solitary mile in 9:47, slower than my average pace during the marathon. Thursday it got better and I did the same mile in 8:40, Friday 8:07, Saturday 8:04 and then on Sunday I broke through and ran my neighborhood mile in 7:40. All better, or so I thought.

There's a nice 1.7 mile hike in the area off the C&O Canal called the Billy Goat Trail that I do every year. It's short but challenging, with large areas over boulder fields where you have to climb up and down three foot tall rocks continuously. It is along the Potomac, and has several panoramic views of the river at overlook points that are, in effect, sheer drop-offs along the sides of cliffs. (Right: The Potomac River as seen from the Billy Goat Trail in MD.)

Scrambling over all of those rock faces on Sunday afternoon reawakened the fire in my trashed quads that the marathon had left me with. On Monday morning my legs felt all beat up again. They feel better today but I hope they get refreshed in a hurry because I have a 3-mile race coming up with a team from work tomorrow morning in SE. I am feeling so not ready for the challenge of a short, sharp race. (Left: Another overlook of the river.)

The Wooden Stairs at Fletcher's...

A Little Run on the C&O. This morning the TMG which I direct for my club passed its halfway mark, six weeks done and six more to go before Army. I "led" the middle group, and we went eight miles on a grand loop through Georgetown starting at Fletcher's Boathouse on the dirt C&O Towpath, going over two bridges in the process. Since the morning was cool, a rarity in DC in August, the running wasn't onerous. Still, I could tell it stretched the endurance of the group, after going from a base of three miles to seven in the first five weeks, so next week we'll stay an additional week on eight miles before we resume our march to a ten mile base.
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We ran down the C&O to Rock Creek Park, then down to and over the Memorial Bridge. The halfway mark was midpoint on the bridge. The back stairs of the Lincoln Memorial go down to the bank of the Potomac River just before the bridge, a series of maybe 100 low marble steps. I ran down them three at a time and then back up for a little bit of extra work. A group of seven or eight athletes were down there also working the steps, carefully balancing on a step, bending low, then leaping, both feet together and knees raised towards the chest each hop, three steps at a time. When they emerged on the veranda leading to the back of the Lincoln, they swigged some water stashed up there in backpacks and turned to go down to the bottom of the stairs again. I asked them what sport they were preparing for.

"The sport of life," said the leader, looking at me hard to see if I was a heckler.

"The grandest sport of them all," I said agreeably.

He invited me to join them. "Every Saturday morning we're here," he said.

It certainly looked hard. I was tempted to try it. All of the athletes were perspiring but even better, except for the leader they were all women. But by then I was on another task.

The two runners at the back of the group hadn't come by yet. While the rest of the runners went over the Memorial Bridge and then cut up the Mount Vernon Trail on the Virginia side to the Key Bridge to return to Fletcher's by running over that back to the C&O, I had to backtrack to find the missing pair, last seen running together. The main group was being led by their regular volunteer coach.

I'm a terrible person, I admit it. While there are 63 persons in the TMG, I can assign a name to a face to only about twenty of them. Embarrassingly, they all know my name. I find myself saying, "Oh, hi!" a lot. Everybody on the planet knows that's shorthand for, "I'm sorry but I haven't bothered to learn your name yet!"

There were a lot of groups out this morning in Rock Creek Park. Montgomery County Road Runners, some Team in Training types, GW Road Runners. I chatted 'em all up as I leapfrogged from group to group, but no DC Roadrunners except for one stray from the program who was independently doing ten miles on her own as she gets ready to do the The Parks Half-Marathon before doing Army. She wasn't a stray that I was looking for. I ran all the way back to Fletcher's by reversing the first half of the route, arriving several minutes before anyone from the main group. The last two miles on the C&O I pressed the pace and practised picking runners off. I was probably doing straight eights by then. In all I did about eight miles in about 69 and a half minutes.

The two missing runners were there, having turned back early. Soon athletes from the other two groups showed up as well, the fast group, which did nine miles on the blacktop Capital Crescent Trail, and the novice group which ran seven miles between the bridges on the C&O.

A Scare. There was some excitement at the hydration point. I had brought the groups' replenishments to the starting point of the run in a backpack, which I left there, unzipped with the bottles of water and Gatorade showing, along with empty cups. Some scared witless American had called the Park Police to report a suspicious package at the top of the wooden stairs leading down to the boat rental shack. Of all the vast array of soft targets available in America, the wooden stairs next to the jogging trail at Fletcher's Boathouse must be at the top of the list! Threats to America are real, but do you remember when we weren't all scared of everything all the time?

Are we following these guys? Here's a clip from YouTube you might like, the Great Bird Hunter presciently calling the occupation of Baghdad a "quagmire." In 1994. Uhh, I think Darth and his sidekick the Decider had something to do with American scaredy-catness.

Odds & Sods. Metro Run & Walk, a good running shoe store in the area, had a signing at their Falls Church store on Thursday night with Alan Webb and Samia Akbar. I got Webb, the American mile record holder at 3:46:91, to sign something for a running friend of mine who is looking to overcome a longstanding time barrier in a race later this year. I had Akbar, who placed twelfth at New York last year in her marathon debut in 2:34:14, sign something for another running friend who is overcoming injuries. Akbar was only, umm, one hour fourteen minutes and twenty seconds faster than me.

She is absolutely lovely and a warm person to boot. She reflected a moment on what little I told her about my friend's adversity and then wrote something very personal and thoughtful. She's not going to get rich quick if she starts attending autograph sessions for money because she added something personal to every signature she gave out, beyond the usual good-luck stuff.

I hope each inscription is inspiring to each friend. Local legend the bionic Ted Poulos was there getting his picture taken with Webb. Three great runners in their own rights (did I say that right?).

I donated blood yesterday for the fifth time this year. I'm still a boring stick-in-the-mud because I haven't done anything wild yet to get booted off the donor list like getting a tattoo or a body piercing or traveling to a Channel Island or having a wild night of...uh, never mind.

Thanks. I want to thank my friend and running mate Beth for her generous support of my effort to run Chicago for a charity, A Running Start. Thanks, Beth! I'm sorry I insulted the Bosox.