the Way of the Turtle

4 Mile Run at Savoy Mountain State Forest
Sunday, October 7, 2012

After hanging around the Monroe Dunbar Brook picnic area a little too long it was really tempting to just bag it and head home - but I managed to convince myself to go to the North Pond picnic area of Savoy Mountain State Forest instead, where I planned to run 6-7 miles, on the South Pond, Tyler Swamp, and North Pond trails. Though "run" may be awfully generous... I plodded along at a pace that most snail's would find painfully slow.

Haven't really been to Savoy in the fall before, so it was nice to see the trails in another season, and I was lucky in that the trails themselves are in good shape, despite a week of rain. I was on the Tyler Swamp trail heading back to South Pond when my Garmin beeped that it was running low on juice - my fault, I forgot to recharge it last night and was only able to get it to 75% before I had to leave for Monroe. My legs were also running low on juice, and it was grey and cold - so I decided to take the short route back and reverse my steps on the North Pond trail, rather than completing the loop. I certainly could have finished the loop, but it would have taken a good deal longer than I wanted to, and I'm pretty sure my legs would have been hurting by the time I was done.

So a few miles less than I had hoped for, but still nothing to sneeze at - especially when 11.5 miles was spent trudging up and down the hills of Monroe State Forest before tackling a bit of Savoy.

JMH