Inspired by the german cycling phrase "ketten rechts" = (move your) chain right = haul ass.
I figured the statement applied well to me in literal terms as I have moved right from Portland to Boston and then again to germany and switzerland.
The blog is written by me, for me, so I have some written record of what I have done. With that said if you want to read it help yourself.
This weekend Jake (a friend from BU) visited me on part of his whirlwind euro-tour. We luckily had great weather to we made it to Uetliberg Luckily my shirt hid sweat better than his. On sunday we got a railpass and hopped a train to where the mountains looked good, on the way we were advised by some swiss to go to Fafleralp since there was a glacier there we could hike to, and lots of different places to explore and come down. So we took their advice and the site actually turned out to be a UNESCO site. Fafleralp Hike at EveryTrail
Map created by EveryTrail: Travel Community And on monday we made it to the Zurich Film Fesival and saw an entertaining but perhaps not soo well thought out french-canadian movie about a kid whose life was ruined by pluto's deplanetification. A pretty decent weekend.
I had heard about Sola DUO from a friend in my running group and he basically kept reiterating how amazing it was, and how really only the craziest of the crazies even attempt it. Naturally I was a little intrigued (It is no real ultramarathon, but a solid leap away from marathon on the crazy scale) So it is a little tricky to explain. It is a team event with two people and one bike. The team must stay together at all times, and they trade off who rides the bike. I had wanted to do it, but my partner backed out, and I ended up finding someone else in the same pool and we happened to be almost exactly the same strength runner.
The run was basically invented because after running Sola (a hood to coast like relay race around the zurich area) a bunch of guys were like this is way to complicated with the logistics of getting everyone to the right start spot and making sure everyone is one time, and knows who they are handing-off to and picking up from. So they simply decided the event could be done with just 2 people and a bike. Where one person rides and recovers (navigates as well) while the other runs, and they just trade off.
It is a brilliant idea, and it was really a blast. You feel really well connected to the outcome and involved in every detail of the strategy. Plus you see the same people the whole time (basically), and everything gets a bit shaken up at every hill climb. Plus having someone ride next to you the whole time really keeps you motivated, and we ran faster than either of us alone could do a single marathon.
Plus it is fun to run in the middle of nowhere and ungodly hours, the world is so calm and silent, and having people leaving the bars look at you with utter astonishment, and again when the newspaper delivery men see everyone and just stare and cheer you on.
I had heard about the ride (Bodensee Radmarathon = Lake Constance Bike Marathon) from a friend of mine and it sounded too cool to skip (3 countries, along the shore, 3rd biggest lake in central europe, sweet tshirts), but I waited until I knew how the weather was going to be before I committed to riding 220km. Plus you got a gold medal is you survived the whole thing and finished in under 12 hours.
The ride itself was great, the support every 30-40km was great with plenty of free snacks and drinks and little places to eat lunch. They even had banana flavored energy drink. The route was relatively flat and avoided traffic areas pretty well, which was nice because around kilometer 200, I was semi-delirious and probably would not have been too safe in a high traffic area.
I also learned that the term radmarathon (biking marathon) cannot be thrown around willy-nilly. It is officially a ride over 200km so my earlier stunt in Emmental at 110km doesnt count (and after doing this, I am thinking that it definitely shouldnt)
So my running group has a Vereinsreise (group trip) every year and this year it was rafting down the Reuss river from Bremgarten to Siggental (just south of where I work). The trip was quite a bit of fun, with almost no effort required. I don't have any pictures and no-one else on the trip has bothered to upload any, but the weather was great, and it was even warm enough (with wind, just barely) to swim. We had a few bruskis on an island, and had a big bbq at the end.
So, thinking I had the hang of this mountain running thing after Belchen was clearly, one of the most horribly wrong thoughts I have ever had. So I was supposed to go sailing but because of the iffy weather, our plans got cancelled the night before. Not wanting to blow a good saturday I looked at laufkalender.ch and found a pretty good looking half-marathon mountain run, going up some trail near interlaken. I read 2200m of vertical climbing but for some reason it didn't strike me as too big of a number (had it said 7000 feet, I may have been more apprehensive)
It was brutal. The first half was a pretty typical berglauf, with some climbs and some flats, and it was easy to keep moving along. After that it basically just turned into straight up climbing. Easily black-diamond slopes for those skiing-inclined. The air also started to get noticably thinner. My lungs really started cranking/burning (we did get to 9,700ft after all). So basically it was two races, the first was a normal mountain run, and the second was a death-march to the summit. The weather also was pretty unpleasant (certainly could have been much worse) with heavy cloud cover and a pretty persistent thick misting rain. Although I was soaked anyway with sweat, so it was hard to tell exactly how bad the rain was. The support, however, was mindblowing. Stations what seemed like every kilometer, with plenty of food, gu, tea, isotonic drink (2 types), and near the end boullion and cola. They even had a new long energy isostar gel, that had solid objects that tasted like oatmeal from birchermuesli, it seemed to work pretty well (my delicious chocolate gu is still in my pack). Plus the freebies included a running waterbottle holder (nice), and the shirt is pretty sweet
After getting back to Switzerland and being pretty lethargic for a couple of days (I blame jetlag), I decided to try my first "berglauf" or mountain run. It was called Belchen (perhaps gaspen would have been more appropriate), and it was in Olten (a city I have been through maybe 50 times, but never actually gotten off and looked around). Plus I didn't remember any huge hills near Olten (again my memory proving how poorly it sometimes operates). The run went up around 2400 feet in 8 miles or so. It had some pretty steep sections that occasionally caused me to walk, but it was doable. I was completely exhausted at the end. The scenery would have been much prettier had the weather been nice, but as it was, it wasn't too bad. One of the things I really liked about this run, and I assume berglaufs in general, is after the start the field automatically sorts out into nice groups, and you really stay together till the end of the race. It helps you stay motivated, and keep your pace since you know the people around you are probably suffering just as badly as you are. It can also be motivating when an old man in a sweat drenched button-up dress shirt passes you.
For the yearly backpacking trip we had thought about for a few years trying to do part of the wonderland trail. This year after much debate we finally made it. We didn't have time to make advance reservations so we basically took the route the ranger gave us from availability.
A picture of a motley group meeting up at our garage at 530am on the day of the hike.
The scenery was fantastic right of the bat. My dad even decided to hike the first few miles with us.
The route was quite difficult with day 1 from Sunrise to Mystic Lake, being much longer than expected. We were pretty beat by the time we got to camp but still managed to get a quick swim and much needed wash in. Some of us literally fell into camp, and didn't come out until the next day.
Day 2 was a nice recovery day walking from Mystic Lake to Carbon River at only 4.9 miles. It was downhill so it beat up our legs a bit, but didn't take much time and allowed us to have a relaxing afternoon to play, wash, and enjoy the river. This isn't carbon river, actually a bit smaller, but you get the idea of how raging they are. The louder sounds in the background our boulders rolling along the bottom of the river.
Here is one of the many waterfalls we saw, this one perfect for cooling off in, and next to it the picture of the carbon river bridge.
Day 3 was a bit more brutal from Mystic Lake to Mowich Lake via Spray Park. The ranger suggested it and said it was a bit more difficult but drastically underestimated the actual difficulty. The first climb in the morning was around 3100 vertical feet in just over 3.5 miles. Some of it was even over glacier
Full version is 48megapixels
It was beautiful and after the climb it was basically all downhill. A highlight being one of the waterfalls at the bottom
Mowich lake was beautiful
, but the campsites there were horrible. A big gravel parking lot with a few kitty litter boxes to put tents it might be the best description. We choose a late night pick up getting home at 3am over a night camping there.
After seeing my bike my landlord decided we should go riding together culminating eventually in this "death ride", maybe it isn't quite as bad as the californian version, but more than tough enough for me.
So we caught the train from Zurich heading south at 630am to "beat the rush", and avoid cycling through the hottest hours of the day. Both of which didnt turn out to be necessary, but as the train ride was a good 2 hours, it gave us time to relax, digest, and mentally prepare for the inevitable. Susten: Susten was the first pass we climbed, it wasnt easy, but since our legs were fresh, and the sky was pretty clear, the climb flew by. At the top
Grimsel: Grimsel was a long tough (15 miles, 6200 vertical feet) climb up from Innertkirchen. It was never really very steep, but it just kept on going, with 3 false summits. I had also eaten through my gummybears at that point so my energy was dipping
Eating lunch at Grimselhöhe was one of the most satisfying things I even done even though it was only simple pasta with tomato sauce
Furka: In comparison to grimsel, furka wasnt so bad, but we were already wiped so it crawled by. The road was pretty constant except for one evily steep stretch in the middle, and the false summit. Coming down there was a perfectly swiss scene of cows crossing the mountain road and blocking traffic
Finally between Andermatt and Göschenen there was a memorial at Teufelsbrücke (Devil's Bridge) to the russian soldiers who died there coming up from the south to attack napoleans forces in northern switzerland.
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