Not 16

I woke up with a runny nose and a scratchy throat. Not exactly how I was hoping to feel on a morning I was planning to do a long run. It was also still raining, and we have a big pond out back where there should be no water. Prognosis for running on the Cathance River Trails, and for running 16 mile today was not looking good. I was feeling bummed out. It has been hard for me to get my long runs in, due to either Sam, or the weather, or Ryan's work schedule or his running plans. It is difficult to juggle everything, and my long runs have been getting the short end of the stick, so I was really looking forward to getting out today for a good chunk of time. But, I was not looking to be stupid either and run myself down if I wasn't feeling 100%. So, I sulked for a bit, and then decided I would go for an hour run after I dropped Sam off at daycare for her 2 hour 'playdate.'

I headed out at 10:30am onto the powerlines. They were soggy, as anticipated, and I hadn't gone much more than 1/2 a mile before my feet were wet. At least it was warm out. It was lightly misting and still windy, but much better than yesterday so that was nice! As I neared the end of the powerlines, I knew that I should probably add the additional 1.5 miles on before turning around, just so I didn't wimp out and only run 5 miles. I figured I would run down to the road and take it from there. When I got to the road, I realized I was only a short distance from a park that has a few trail signs, and which we are always driving by and commenting on how we should stop and check them out. So I figured, what the heck.

The park has a great sledding hill in the wintertime, and the trailhead leads you up to the top of this hill and then smaller trails fan out from there. I just sort of meandered around on the trails to check it out - the trails twist and turn on themselves in the woods and all pretty much end in surrounding neighborhoods. Not much running per se, but nice nonetheless! By the time I got back to the trailhead, I realized my run would be a bit longer than anticipated if I headed back on the powerlines, so instead I took the roads back to Highland Green and then turned onto the powerlines for the final stretch. Overall, despite having a bit of a cold, I felt good throughout and it was fun to explore some new trails!