Shenandoah Round Three--or how I survived my close encounter with Mrs. Bear

So, up and at 'em at 3:25 a.m. with a little nudge from Judy.  Botched the first pot of coffee and then recovered nicely on the 2nd--in the Black Beauty at 3:57 with a cupa Kona's finest and headed south to Shenandoah National Park for my 3rd SNP session of my Aconcagua training (and general enjoying of the outdoors).  Uneventful trip and rolled into Thorton Gap after 192 miles around 7:20--only to discover the Northern Sector (where I planned to hike) would not open until 8:00 am.  No worries.  I went to Panorama and got everything ready and when the gate opened I was on my way north up Skyline Drive to just before MP 19.  My loop for the day is called the Piney Ridge/Overall Run Perimeter Circuit.  This was advertised as a strenuous 12.7-mile/3000 ft vertical affair estimated to take 7:45.

I was saddled up and rolling by just before 8:30 am.  I had to be back to Thorton Gap by 5 pm or else I would be spending the night in my car as the gate closed at 5.  When I left, the temp was 10 degrees and the wind was blowing in gusts of 40-50mph up on the ridge!

With the wind-chill well into minus territory I opted for 4 layers up top: base and mid merino wool layers with my First Ascent 800 fill down sweater under my soft-shell.  A warm hat and my "I mean business" gloves completed the picture.  

The first part of the trail was a breeze.  I feel like all of my recent climbing/trekking training is paying off and frankly the trail was of quite modest challenge.  My first five miles were all well under 30 minutes and while I was a bit chilly, I was fine given the pace I was pushing.  It was truly splendid hiking:

BTW, I noticed my camera was in HDR (High Dynamic Range) mode, which was annoying because it took three photos every time I depressed the shutter and then I had to wait for the camera to process the composite picture for 4-5 seconds.  I thought about trying to change it but I forgot how to and I didn't want to figure it out because it was so cold.  Plus, the HDR pics are pretty nice....

After around 5 miles or so I passed the Dwyer family cemetery, which was 30-40 yards off the trail.  It's hard to find and the souls have been resting there for a long-long time:

As I approached the noon hour I decided to stop and take off my down layer as I knew I was facing a strenuous and extended climb.  I also thought it might be a good time to eat one of my salami and turkey on an onion roll specials.  I saw this great felled tree (with exposed roots) right near the trail that was in the sun and looked like a perfect place to stop and do my "transition":

The following is my best recollection of what then took place over the next 30 seconds or so.  I can't guarantee it's accuracy but it will have to do as the other four witnesses have all since disappeared: 

I sat my trekking polls down and took my gloves off.  I took my Garmin off the outside of my left arm on my soft-shell.  I loosened and unsnapped all of my pack's hardware and was just beginning to slip my pack off when I heard a noise behind me.  I turned and there about 8-10 feet or so away, on my tree trunk was a young, but not that small bear cub.

I said something akin to: "Ohahewa".  The cub took this as a command to jump down and leap over to a tree a few feet behind and shimmy up 2-3 feet.  During this time, I suspect I did nothing.  Elapsed time at this point was about 7-8 seconds.

I snapped to and grabbed my gloves, my Garmin (I need my data) and my polls and started moving to the right.  At this point my brain begain to inquire about the possibility of a mother and I stopped and looked quickly around.  Cumulative elapsed time: 12-15 seconds.  Seeing nothing, and thinking of you dear blog readers (actually, I didn't think of you), I unzipped the breast pocket of my soft-shell and whipped out my camera and snapped this picture:

I was hoping to capture the cub and at first glance I didn't.  However, let me add the picture back again at full resolution--I'm hoping you can scroll around on it and see what I actually did capture:

In case you missed it--here are two enlarged sections--first the cub up on the tree:

And then unbeknownst to me--take a peek at what was emerging from the hole near the roots of my lunch tree:

Yes, that would be Mrs. Bear.  At this point we are at about 15-17 seconds since I first heard the cub behind me.  Mama sees me and knows her cub is out there somewhere.  I don't see Mama as I'm trying to take a pic of baby bear.

About a second later I hear Mama and we lock eyes.  She jumps out of the hole and it registers in my brain that this is a pretty big bear (certainly big enough!) and instinctively I know its mama bear.  Elapsed time 18 or so seconds and before I can think of what to do, Mama turns to her right (my left) and sprints away.  At about 20 seconds or so baby bear jumps down from the tree and follows.  (As far as I can recall, I continue to do nothing).

Then to my amazement, out of the hole crawls another baby bear.  (I think I should take a picture and I think I try to but my camera provides no record--I'll blame it on the HDR).  Elapsed time 24-25 seconds.  And then baby number three crawls out and high-tails it outta there.  Elapsed time 30 seconds.  

I snap out of whatever fog I've been in and move (pretty quickly) in the opposite direction as my lunch friends.  I'm not sure about the whole daddy bear thing but I would prefer to stay that way.  I stop and take this last picture of my lunch tree where you can see how close we all were:

So I have to admit I looked over my shoulder quite a few times in the ensuing 15 minutes.  I was JACKED and kinda thinking the whole thing was actually pretty cool.  I pulled out one of my sandwiches and decided to eat it on the move.  Wow--pretty exciting out here in the wilderness!

Anyways, the rest of the hike was much more basically hike-like.  The last 3-miles were actually a very demanding 3+ mile climb up the "Little Devil Stairs" which turned out to be quite demanding.  There were even some legit scrambling sections (although not like Old Rag):

That last one required a bit of focus.  The last mile or so was more mellow and soon I found myself back at my car:

At the end of the day it was quite the adventure!  I'm thankful for having run into the non-confrontational bear family!

Training-wise, I felt fantastic.  My training program is really working.  I'm cautiously optimistic about Aconcagua.  I did just under 13 miles today in around 6:15 (almost 1:30 faster than advertised).  My elevation gain was over 3200 feet.  Tomorrow, I'll do a similar effort....

Here is the Garmin data:

Baldy et al....

Great little five day stretch where I was able to spend time with all four of my kids in four different cities.  The highlight was a 4-day visit with Anders in his new digs in Santa Monica.

With the big training week last week and all the travel this week featured less volume.  I put in 22 hours of training with about half involved in trekking/climbing.  I also recorded 137 miles on the bike, 15 miles running and a weights session.  I also jumped back in the pool and swam surprisingly strong given the 7-week hiatus.

The highlight of the week was climbing Mt. Baldy with Anders (our second time).  With no snow we couldn't poon up the face so we opted to do the full Baldy loop--up sthe ski shack side and then the arduous and exposed way down via the Devil's backbone.  This turned out to take us 6:10 with about 11.8-miles of linear distance and around 4000 feet of vertical.  I'm plane-bound at the moment so I'll upload some pics when I can download them to my computer.  In the meantime here are three pics that Anders took on his iPhone:

Last Week

Good solid Aconcagua training week last week.  I logged 30:13 of training time--21:30 was rucking/climbing and the balance being running, weights and cycling.  I recorded a modest 116 miles of the later (over 4 days).  I'm heading up to NYC and then out to LA this week so things will be a bit mixed up.  I am currently nplanning on climbing Baldy out in LA with Anders this weekend which will be good solid prep wotk for sure!

Onward and upward!

Shenandoah Solo Day 3

Yesterday I finished off my solo trip to SNP with a bang by climbing Old Rag Mountain by my lonesome.  Old Rag stands a modest 3,291 feet but it is unique among all the mountains in SNP in that it is a stand-alone mountain as opposed to a mountain top along the Blue Ridge.  The Old Rag curcuit is the most popular climb in all of Shenandoah with some 100,000 people doing it each year.  The big highlight is a fairly treacherous 1.2-mile Grade 3 rock scramble along the summit ridge up to the summit.  (A Grade 3 rock scramble btw is climbing where the use of your hands is required to climb--not merely for balance.  Usually protection is not required and falls are not always fatal.  If protection is necessary and falls are usually fatal then its considered Grade IV).

I arrived at the parking lot around 7:15 and saw just two other cars there and no people.  I was off carrying my daypack (a lot of tight squeezes on this scramble).  It was overcast and somewhat ominous looking as I left at 7:30 but it progressively brightened into a beautiful day as I climbed.  It was also quite a bit milder than the prior two days and I mostly climbed in a wool t-shirt.  The ascent to the ridge was realtively easy and very pleasant.  I was covering a mile every 30 minutes or so.

I was a bit concerned with how wet everything was.  With the weather change there was a lot of condensation and as I was on the western side of the ridge it was shielded from both the sun and the wind--I was worried about slippery rock surfaces during the scramble.  Finbally, around mile 3 I hit the bottom of the scramble and my fears proved to be well-founded.  Here is a pic of the first pitch:

This is about 20 feet high with very slippery rocks.  At first I tried the rocks and readily slipped which was quite alarming.  I was finally able to angle up the right side with only a bit of concern at the top.  After this, I sat down for a couple of minutes and seriously considered turning around.  You're really suppossed to do this as part of a group--in part because some sections benefit from teamwork but also in case of a fall.  I decided after a few moments of reflection to push on but to try to minimize relying on purchase on the slippery rock surfaces.

Here is another early pitch--closer to 30 feet in height that I was able to scale by working the left side:

This was difficult, strenuous climbing and while I was worried about my safety, I found it absorbing and exhilarating.  From time to time the exposed ridge provided stunning views:

At one point, the blue arrow marking the scramble path pointed straight down.  When I peered over the edge I saw I had to wedge myself down about a 15-foot drop.  I literally said out loud: "Really?"  It was easier than it looks:

The rocks along the route were pretty amazing:

After about 40 minutes or so I hit the crux of the scramble.  This is a relatively sheer face about 7 feet high with no available means to wedge.  It took me a while but I solved it by placing my left boot in that crack at the bottom left and reaching up and grabbing the top of the face with my hands.  I then pulled myself up and was able to swing my right knee and lower leg up and over the ridge at its lower section on the right.  With a burst of effort I was able to move my center of mass up onto the ridge.  I was panting heavily after this move!

Another cool rock on the way up:

After a very strenous 90 minutes I made the summit.  I passed a couple climbing together on the way up but they were mving slowly so I spent 15 minutes or so eating a snack on the summit all by myself.  It was very rewarding!  The weather was perfect--about 60 degrees and very sunny.  Fantastic views!

I went down the easier back way to complete the circuit and passed close to 20 people on their way up.  Towards the bottom of the fire road you hike out at the end, I passed through an incredible grove of white oaks--stunning:

So, the total round-trip took 5:08 and covered 9.4-miles. With a total gross elevation gain of 3,203 feet.  I had both my fastest and slowest miles of the three days on this hike: 18:13 and 73:26.  The latter was mile 4 during the bulk of the scramble.  In that mile I had 1,299 up feet and 565 down feet, which means the AVERAGE gradient was over 35 degrees during that mile.

Here are the Garmin details:

For the three days my totals were: 35.2 miles and 10,580 gross elevation gain of 19:03.  As Anders used to say: "Money in the bank"!

Very lucky to be out here....

Second of my three day solo in Shenandoah....I did a 14+ mile romp along the AT and then up and over the summit of Neighbor Mountain and then a very steep descent to Jeremy's Run (Run being a term for a stream) and then a 5+ mile climb back out.  7+ hours in total.  I never saw a deer, a bear or any human--pretty epic!  Below are my Garmin highlights:

shenandoah!

So, last night brought little sleep.  weird...no event to trouble me...and I am the king of sleepers....still,  just jacked and so about 2 hours or so of shut-eye....

alarm set for 3:45 but turned it off at 3:32....ready to rock and fresh brewed (Kona of course) and rolling in the Black Beauty at 3:52 precisely. 

Through Baltimore and DC before they were really awake and onto the magical HWY-211 in Virginie as the sun stretched it's muscles.

On through Thorton Gap and then out and doing it by 7:52am.  I'm impressed by that because i did it....not easy to do truth be told

Up through Hawksbill Summit (highest peak in the SNP)  and then the White Oaks loop.  Very challenging and rewarding day.  Almost 7 hours.  Great weather.  Here are some of the bonafides:

In the groove...

Tallied 24:51 of training this week (not bad for the "off-season").  I did 9:15 on the bike  (147 miles) and remainder was either running or rucking.

I'm soloing down in Shenandoah the next three days.  Tomorrow I'm doing White Oaks Canyon and Hawksbill summit (the later being the highest point in Shenandoah).  This will clock in at a bit over 11 miles and about 4000 feet of vertical.  I'm only carrying around 35 pounds but I am getting up at 4 am to drive the 200+ miles so it will be a longish day.

Tueday I'm doing the Jeremy's Run/Neighbor Mountain loop in the Northern Sector--this has about 3000 feet of vertical but is spread out over 14.5 miles.  Wednesday sees me tackling the Grade 3 rock scramble that the Old Rag Summit trip is famous for.  This is a challenging but realtively short (8.8 miles) trail.  All told I'm looking at 34-35 miles and probably about 18-20 hours over the next three days.

the weather looks great--ideal really.  sunny and very cool--should be around 25-28 degrees when I hitch it up tomorrow morning....loving it!