Afternoon Walk

Cooldown

Lookout Mtn 10k - 1st OA

Warmup

Cold, windy, and wet (kind of)

This was an  epic "run" - there's so much to tell about it:

Started at the Jacks River Trailhead in Alaculsy. Continued along the Jacks River for almost 10 miles and crossed the river innumerable times. It was raining, so I barely noticed getting wet in the river. The rocks were slick and I fell over several times. I liked the crossings less and less after each one. The trail was very overgrown, so I had to do a fair bit of route finding and I actually completely lost the trail at one point, for the first time in years. Went past the Jacks River Falls - I'm not really in to waterfalls but these looked very cool.

Left the riverbed on the Penitentiary Branch Trail and then the Licklog Ridge Trail to climb up to Big Frog Mountain. The final climb was very steep - over 1k ft in a mile. 

Descended Big Frog via Chestnut Mtn, then followed forest service roads for the last ~7 mi to return to where I started. I developed a stabbing pain in my right foot over the last 4 miles, so I walked quite a bit more than otherwise. Oh well, hopefully the pain is gone soon.

Funny story #1: I used Gaia on my phone to navigate. My phone GPS was a little off the whole day, but I hadn't noticed it before this: I got to where the GPS said the Penitentiary Branch Trail should cross the Licklog Trail, but there was no junction. I looked up and down the trail and couldn't find anything. I started freaking out, since if the trail didn't exist, my only options were to bushwhack along where the trail should be, turn around and go back the way I came, go a super long way around by another trail, or go to a road and get a ride back, and I reeeeally didn't want to take any of those options. I decided to bushwhack, whacked my way 20 feet through some thorns, and found the missing trail. The junction was actually just around the corner. If I had kept going another 200 ft I would have easily found it (<cue to laugh> hahaha).

Funny story #2: When I was younger and significantly less mature (last semester) I used to love taking my Toyota Corolla out on muddy-ish forest service roads and driving as fast as I could. Eventually I matured very fast when I gave myself a flat and tore off the plastic cover for one of my wheel wells (I intentionally haven't driven on a gravel road since haha).  I had no idea where during my drive I actually punctured my tire or lost my wheel well cover. Anyways, I found the wheel well cover along the road towards the end of my route. I had never expected to see it again haha

Light rain, 62°F, Feels like 62°F, Humidity 88%, Wind 5mph from SSW - by 

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Jonathan Ziesmer

Big Frog Mtn FKT via Jacks River Trail

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Afternoon Walk

Cooldown

Lookout Mtn 10k - 1st OA

Warmup

Cold, windy, and wet (kind of)

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