Warm Weather!

This week it has been warm enough to open the windows, not wear a jacket during the day, for the crocuses to bloom outside the office and for a lot of the snow to melt. Finally! Spring really is coming :)

Tuesday morning, I thought I'd try out the cart paths and see what I could find. Well, things are quite soft out there and there were still some good stretches of packed snow/ice, but it was great to get off the pavement and onto the "dirt"! Felt like a lot of effort for the pace due to the squishy surface but a nice 6 mile run nonetheless.

Yesterday, I stuck to the 5 mile Highland Green loop, going out by way of the powerlines. I headed out at 5:45 am and it was light enough to not need a headlamp :) The powerlines are still pretty messy but the back dirt road had been nicely graded. A nice, warm morning and I was treated to a porcupine sighting too! He rambled across the road and into someone's yard around 2.5 miles in. Didn't seem concerned about me at all ;) Also saw one of our resident raccoons eating some seed out back and heard lots of birdsong!

This morning, I could not resist heading down to the river, despite the fact that Sunday's hike indicated there was still plenty of snow in the woods. I ran up and over Mt. A., enjoying the sight of the sun rising through the pine trees. I was pleasantly surprised to find that all the snow on the Mt. A. road had melted along with plenty on the cart paths too as I ran holes 1, 2 and 3 before veering off onto the Heath Trail. The Heath was also mostly free of snow although plenty squishy :)

Even the snow that we had found on the short lollypop down to and along the river had melted significantly and man, was the river roaring! A good 6.2 miles for the morning for sure!

Looking forward to some NC sunshine this next week and then excited about the thought of getting back out on the trails at home as things should be in good shape with another week+ of warm weather and melting snow!