Today was a fairly sobering run. It was my longest in a while -- 16 miles -- but it was the route that caused me a lot of angst. I ran down Snoqualmie Parkway half way before cutting over to the ole miner's trail on the eastern border of Snoqualmie Ridge. Much of the trail was all mut washed out and will take some work to make it safe again. A mile down the path and I was in lower Snoqualmie which was hit very hard with flooding. There was, fittingly, a steady drizzle falling during the whole run which made it even harder to watch hundreds of people begin the difficult cleanup of their inundated home. By all accounts, this was the worst flood on record for a town that has seen it all. Homes that have never seen flood waters were engulfed this time around.
The flood waters were completely receded today, but the damage was just beginning to be seen. Virtually every house I ran by had what could very well have been the entire collection of furniture, carpet, herilooms, etc, piled high in the driveway waiting to be hauled off to the dump.
There is a wood carver in town who does those large tree-stump sized carvings. This is his living. The flood waters scattered his many wood carvings across a very large field and beyond. Several people were out looking for them. I spotted a few and pointed them out to the guy. It almost brought tears to my eyes.
Two short weeks ago I was complaining to myself about the thrice-daily show shovelings and the 3-4 foot snow drifts at my house. At least my family was warm and safe.
Anyway...this is a running blog, but running today seemed a bit secondary life altering effects of the most recent weather here.
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