Monday, May 2, 2011

Slide Lake Loop

This is a slideshow of our long run yesterday (thanks to Derrick and Mac). Slide Lake Loop in Frontenac Park is 30ish km of amazing trail running. It’s one of my favourite runs ever, despite the fact it invariably destroys me by the end. Flagpole Hill and Devil’s Gorge are my top two spots in the park, but because the loop is so big and there aren’t ‘escape’ options, I don’t see them very often. Yesterday the conditions were very good, unlike in the summer when the trail gets grown over with grasses that hide rocks and tangle around your ankles, and the deer flies are bad. Aside from some muddy spots, the biggest obstacles yesterday were the dozens of blowdowns from the big storm last week. The trail is all single-track, mostly very gnarly, and constantly rolls up and down, with a lot of steep ridges through gorges. It's a full-body workout.

The 'official' Slide Lake Loop uses Cedar Lake Loop as its western side, but we always come back along the south-eastern Big Salmon trail instead (from the junction near campsite 4).

Surprisingly we didn't see any deer, just a lot of hawks, one live beaver and a dead one. The dead one looked like fresh kill, so maybe we briefly scared away whatever was feeding on it. Too bad, it would have been neat to see the coyotes or whatever it was.

My first run over 4 hours in a long time. I felt structurally pretty good given that, which was encouraging.


11 comments:

Eliza Ralph-Murphy said...

Is that beaver dam part of the official trail? Also nice to see you two in your natural habitat. Have you ever considered moving closer to the Park?

Sara Montgomery said...

It is part of the trail, yes! I came a bit too close to falling in. Even when tiptoeing across, they are sketchy. There are quite a few dams as part of trails in the park. If you look at the iRunFar forums, the one for Canada, Bryon captioned: "A place to discuss the land where a beaver dam can be a trail." This was after Derrick took him running at Frontenac. There's some URG fodder for you maybe. :)

Derrick said...

Some pretty smelly trail shoes from those dams too.

Meghan said...

Yay! Awesome slideshow, thanks for putting it together. I don't comment much, but I always read your blog. Elated to hear you're body is on the up and up. :)

Sara Montgomery said...

Derrick, True, and I hope we can't contract giardia through our feet.

Thanks so much, Meghan!

Buttons Thoughts said...

Sara thanks so much for taking me on your run it was awesome. I really must check out this park.
I love the music it was nice just to sit back and enjoy this.
Great scenery. B

Sara Montgomery said...

Thanks, Buttons. Derrick picked the music too, it's the Decemberists, a really great band from Oregon.

N.D.C.I. Yearly Reunion said...

Beautiful trails.

Stonehaven.

William said...

Thanks for the chill journey through your run! Glad things are going well and you had a solid outing.

Aliza Lapierre said...

Did I hear you won entry into Transrockies? I did that race last year and it is an amazing experience! It was a difficult decision but I decided to do another race this year instead of TR. If you have questions about anything I would gladly answer them.

Sara Montgomery said...

It's true, Aliza. I can't quite believe it! We're so excited and happy about it!

I have a million questions, but when I can narrow it down to, say, a few hundred good ones, I'll be sure to take you up on that offer! Thank you. :)