The sun is up, the air is fresh, the stone is old

Off day.

Off day.  Heading up to Anchorage for a few days.  Probably get in a few easy, small trail runs but mostly hiking.  The knee seemed to handle the last two weeks of running OK so that means it's time to stop worrying about it and get training.

Nice trail run outside of Anchorage.  Barely even Spring here.  This morning I stopped by Gwennies Old Alaska Restaraunt again for breakfast.  It's been almost a year since going to this breakfast spot that is filled with locals.  The plates are huge.  I had the sourdough pancakes with reindeer sausage which is one of the best breakfasts in the world that you can get!

Off day. Hiked Tabletop mountain in Anchorage, about 7 miles.

Off day.  But I did dig 375 feet of trenches in my yard with a pickax for a sprinkler system.  That took 5.5 hours and FELT like a marathon.

Last day for slacking, running starts tomorrow again.  I finished the entire sprinker sysem today on my yard by working through most the night and having help from neighbors.  Huge job done.  Now I'm getting folks on the plane for a flight up to Fairbanks tonight.  This is one of my favorite overnights since we stay at little log cabins on the side of the river  (Pike's Waterfront Lodge) for two days.  I hope to get in some late night running in the sun again.

Some days are so beautiful that you just want to soak them in.  You never want them to end.  Today was one of those.  Since I had a few days in Fairbanks, Alaska I headed up to Nenena to race the Annihilator for fun.

http://www.newsminer.com/article_802d6c6f-fc4b-5187-bee4-fefffdb55ac6.html

Supposed to be one of the hardest 10ks there is so I figured it would be a good offset for all the Utah style downhill races.  Unfortunately there was still 18 inches of snow on the trails in the high country so they cancelled it last minute.  So I went back down to Fairbanks and was lucky enough to find a really sweet trail that headed off the oil pipeline north.  It was covered in bark, moss, or grass the whole way and was so soft that I took off my shoes and ran a few miles in barefeet.  Maybe halfway in I came across a trail junction which had a sign on it for the Equinox Marathon course.  So I joined that for the rest of the run which took me down to the University of Alaska campus.

Legs are doing great today on my return to running.  No soreness at all which must be the days off and running a smart marathon last week.