While spending the week with my parents in Colorado, I thought I'd see if Aaron K would want to try and get a run around Boulder while I was in town. He was nice enough to comply, so we met up early in the morning. I'm sure his neighbors thought I was casing the joint as I was walking up to his house in my all black ninja running getup to make sure I had the right house. Once I was fairly certain I had the right place (the minivan and LOTOJA window stickers helped), I chilled in my car until Aaron appeared from the dark. We exchanged a brief greeting that started out right from his house, running about a mile or so before we hit the trail. We chatted as we began a nice gradual climb that would last about the next 2 to 2.5 miles. The trail was mostly dry with little patches of snow or ice every now and then. No need for the spikes here (yet :)) Beautiful views of Boulder as the sun was just starting to peek out over the distant horizon. About a half mile of downhill before we met up with another trail and started heading up again. I was probably good for about a half mile, and then the incline really picked up as the trail turned into what I called never-ending stadium stairs, which didn't take long before I had to start to hike it. Aaron just kept powering up that climb. The forest got to be quite thick with pine, and contrasted with the snow and the rocky trail (aka "rockstairs") it was a gorgeous place to be. There were a few switchbacks and at times I felt like I was in a movie where the person thinks they're seeing things in the forest - I would see Aaron above me and then it was like he would disappear, only to appear again a little later-Last of the Mohicans style. :) Totally cool, I love that kind of rugged terrain. I finally made it to the top of the trail, and Aaron was nowhere in sight (again) so I just started down the other side, only to run into him coming back up. We thought about going to the end of that trail (sign said it was only a quarter mile) but Aaron had to get back so we decided to head back down. The first 4 miles and were about 1000 feet of gain, that last mile was 800 (most of it being in the second half of it). We went down at a decent pace, although we did take it a little easy since this top section was pretty much all snow and ice, and a slip here would have hurt really bad! We both came close a couple of times, but were able to keep it together. Once we were out of the steep stuff we were able to have a nice fun jog down. We took a little different route back, taking a trail cutting through some wider open forest and then down a different road back to the house. I had a great time and really enjoyed the views and running new trails. Thanks to Aaron for showing me the place! I later told him that I actually appreciate getting dropped like that because it keeps me humble and keeps me going! :) | 