Monday, December 17, 2007
Another Monday off from school. Not that I mind having a day off... but missing class time is especially tough for my AP classes, which are on a tight schedule to begin with if we want to cover the entire curriculum. Ah, well, so it goes...
I could hear the wind howling when I got up this morning... that led me to put off going outside for a while, and fortunately it died down a bit as the day progressed. I had originally planned to get out for a run on my snowshoes, but decided instead to take advantage of being out during daylight and spend some time on my XC skiis instead.
I first went XC skiing in college, as part of a phys ed class I took, and really enjoyed it. Rented skiis a couple of times in the mid-90's, and enjoyed it even more... so much so that in the end I invested in a set of my own, and spent several winters happily exploring various parks and trails in western Massachusetts. Opportunities to ski were definitely fewer once I moved to Albany, or at least I thought they were... now I'm much more familiar with the many places I could go to glide through the snow. Unfortunately, the last few winters have been somewhat light on snowfall, and much of the time when there was snow I was out on my snowshoes, training both for races and for running in the spring. It doesn't help that I'm at best a medicore skiier, especially on hilly terrain, which means I generally won't go skiing at night - my prime time for hitting the trails from November through March!
Since this was the first time I'd been out this year, and my right hip/groin muscles were still a bit sore from the weekend, I knew I wanted to avoid hills, which rather limited my options. In the end I decided on the Corning Preserve despite the non-stop traffic noise from the nearby highways, for a very simple reason - it's close enough that travel time was minimal.
Drove down to the waterfront parking lot under I-787, gathered up my gear, and headed off into the park. The entrance is a fairly narrow path which had been plowed, so I ended up walking about a quarter mile before I could hit the snow. Surprisingly, no one had been out yet, so I ended up breaking trail for the first 3/4 of a mile. That's always tough work, whether it's on snowshoes or skiis, and the icy crust on top of the snow didn't help.
About a mile in the plowed section ended, though someone had driven a vehicle down the path after one of the recent storms - there were two distinct tire tracks running down the path, filled partially in with a couple of inches of snow. I hopped into one of the tracks, and found it much easier going. So much so, that when my watch timer went off to indicate that should turn around and go back, I kept going for another half mile or so, even though that meant I might end up getting back to the car in the dark.
Once off the plowed path, the only other trail users were the local critters. I saw lots of deer tracks - apparently they were taking advantage of the tire tracks too. A little over a mile in I actually saw two deer munching on some plants next to the trail, and I'm pretty sure I heard some moving around in another section as well.
Eventually I reached fresh tire tracks - looks like someone was checking on one of the towers for the power lines that cross the Hudson about 2 miles into the park. I took that as a signal to turn around, since skiing in fresh tracks was going to be a bit harder than what I'd been doing (not to mention - it was getting late!) The trip back was initially much easier than the trip out - XC skiing goes so much more smoothly when track has been laid already! Along the way I spotted a fox ahead of me on the path, but he bounded off into the brush before I could get a picture.
The last stretch, along the edge of the field that borders the plowed path, was a bit tougher. On the way out my skiis had stayed on top of the ice crust until I put my weight on them and they broke through. On the way back the ski was down in the track, which drove the toes of my boots against the crust lining the top of each track, and my feet were taking a beating. I fairly quickly abandoned my previous track and ended up breaking a new trail across the field. More hard work!
So in the end I didn't get to go as far as I would have liked (I either should have gotten out there earlier or I should have brought my headlamp!) But it was still a good first ski of the season... hopefully I can get out on my skiis a lot more this winter than I did last winter!
JMH
