December Adventures

 There was not a lot of running or adventuring in December. If I'm being honest, recovery after our 100 miler took a lot longer than I expected. I guess that happens with age. 😅 Sometimes I still treat my body like I'm in my 20s or 30s, and I expect it to recover like it used to. I'm finding out that is just not the case. We definitely needed the physical break to let our aches and pains heal, but we were also totally burned out mentally. We needed a few weeks off. 

Cress Creek Canal:

Mark and I went on a nice easy hike on the Cress Creek Canal a couple weeks after the race. We just wanted to take inventory of how everything was feeling.

We always see eagles on this route in the winter.

Palisades:

Steph, Mark, and I did a hike to lower palisades lake. It felt so good to get out with zero expectations. We just hiked along chatting, and it was just what I needed. No pace to keep, no pressure on mileage, just a fun day out in the snow. We did 8.5 miles, and my knee definitely felt it by the end, but I finally felt like I was wanting to be out there again.

Lower Lake

The trail had just the right amount of snow on it!

The Butte:

I tried my first post race run with Joyce on the Butte. We took it easy, and I felt really good. We did 6.5 miles, and I felt good while we were out there, but my knee was pretty bad afterwards. Winter is my favorite time to run the Butte. I love when everything is all frosty.

We had a cool experience when we finished running. I saw a big moose in someone's front yard on my way to the butte. Then when I was almost to the trailhead, I glance to the side and saw what I thought was probably a moose in the dried up sunflower field. I basically just saw a dark spot, so I wasn't positive. I told Joyce about it, and she had her camera with her, so when we were done running we drove down to have a look. Sure enough, there were 4 moose in the sunflower field.  

I did an 8.5 mile run with some awesome ladies, and that was the first time I ran pretty consistently. I'm just glad I finally feel like getting out there again. No pictures from this one.

Wolf Flats:

Ashlee organized a group run on Wolf Flats. It was a go your own pace and distance run. This was Mark's first post race run. He was a little stiff, but otherwise felt pretty good. I felt great on this one. I finally had no knee pain, and felt like I was getting the spring back in my step. I love Wolf Flats in the dark, and I love it in the winter. 

The gang!

So pretty and peaceful in the early morning light with fresh snow.

That was it for December.

 I got my 2024 Strava results, and I'm pretty proud of them. I increased a lot on mileage and elevation. I decreased a little bit in how many days I was active, but that was due to taking so much time off in November and December, which was needed. I'm going to relish those results, because they won't be that good next year. We will keep running of course, but not nearly the intensity we put in the past few years. We are going to keep our weekends mostly free to work on farm projects.

I'm excited to set some different fitness goals in 2025!