Is That Trail Runner Enough? And Tofino Sun!

Wow. THAT is an Elite Trail Runner Beard.

So I'm really getting into this West Coast hippie thing. Looking like a real trail runner! My soon to be sister-in-law says I look like I'm from Bowser Bay, which I'm pretty sure is a compliment. Anyhoo, Portage doesn't like it much.

Me: "But all the top trail runners look like this" I explain. "Krupicka, Tim Olsen, Joe Grant."
Her: "Look how thin they are."
Me:"Look how hairy they are. I'm looking like a real contender now"
Her: "You could lose some weight. Or go for an actual trail run."
Me: "But my toe hurts."
Her: What about the guy on the cover of your "Trail Runner" magazine? He doesn't have a beard.
Me: That guy is only 20 years old. He can't grow a beard. Same as Dakota Jones.
Her: "There's a good barber in Parksville. "
Oh well, I guess that's why they say Men are from Venus, Women are from Mars.

A friend of ours made us an offer we couldn't refuse, and lent us her condo just outside of Tofino for a couple of days. It was raining when we arrived Monday night, but we awoke to a beautiful, sunny day on Tuesday.

The Weather Gods were with us. We had the only sunny, warm(60˚F) day of the week. Can you see the surfers?

Sweet Oceanside single track.

 We had a really great couple of days on the wild side of the Island with The Girl. She is home from University for reading week.

This restaurant was featured on 5 star chef Lynn Crawford's T.V. show "Pitchin' In". Portage was excited.

  So we visited Gary's Kitchen in Tofino specifically for the Cantonese Crab. Unfortunately, the fishermen hadn't brought the crab in yet, and you have to give them 2 hours notice if you want to order it. DOH. So I had a burger. 'Tage had the wings, The Girl had Ginger Chicken. You can read about my awful burger experience by clicking here.

The Girls

  Tofino is on the "Wet Coast" of Vancouver Island, but we had a perfect day of warm sunshine. There is a marathon/half-marathon here that we might run in June. The route includes beach, trail and road running. It's point to point, from Tofino to Ucluelet. (you-clue-let). It's called the Edge to Edge Marathon.

We had lunch at The Black Rock Resort. Excellent food and ocean view.

  We had a tough time finding a restaurant that was open for the season, but finally located the amazing "Black Rock Resort" in Ucluelet, owned by former Beverly Hills 90210 star Jason Priestly, who happens to be from Vancouver. His father runs the place.
   We had a fantastic lunch, I put my excellent chicken burger up on the 50 Burger Challenge web site, but had to disqualify it later because it's not red meat.You can read that food review here.

Nice view, but I am lost.

 Here are some artsy fartsy beach photos from Portage

This is Long Beach. Can you see another surfer? Many of them are from Australia, and come here to work in the coffee shops,restaurants and bars. They surf when they aren't working.

Bull kelp. 'Cause it's shaped like a bull whip.

That's mist from the huge waves.

Winter Waves. People come here to see this.

The marathon goes down this beach.

Past here......

And here. This isn't even low tide

Tide's coming in, made us scramble!

The girls. Someone had randomly written "Tie Domi" in the sand. Weird.

Surfin' Bird

Oooooooohhhhhh.....

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh.....

Mussles. A fellow was filling up grocery bags with them. Great eating,and free.

I Call This Pitcher "Shoulda Been Lunch at Gary's".

Kennedy Lake on the way home. My 2nd favourite photo.

         My Favourite Photo, again, Kennedy Lake, on the way home from Tofino/Ucluelet.

OK, I couldn't choose between this one......

And This One.

Well, as you can see, we are really missing the snow in Ontario. Apparently, they are having a really bad winter! Well, gotta go fill up the hummingbird feeders.

That's Better. And West Coast Observations.

 Well I am now up to 56K running in January, and starting to feel stronger out there. We even fit in a bike ride and a couple of swims. I have a couple of new routes, I used Map My Run to see the elevation and distance.Ignore the times, I start the thing up and then remember something I forgot and don't start running for a while. Mostly I'm running 5:30-6minute K's, can't push it just yet.

This is a double loop, I thought it was about 10k. Turns out it's 8k. DOH.

This is the "Dave's Lookout run. I figured it was about 10k. It's 8.67K. DOH.

Elevation for the double loop. I figured it would look like this.

Elevation for Dave's Lookout. Remember, these are meters people. I think that's about 1,000 ft in regular measurements, but I'm a little rusty on converting. But it sure felt like more than that....

 So, I have already set 2 FKT's out here. An FKT is a "Fastest Known Time". My two are
1) 49:50- My front door to Dave's Lookout, back to Andover,out the Golf Club Road, past the mailbox and home.
2) 46:28- My front door to Fairwinds, Double Loop-past the mailbox and home. That one might stand for a while.

Some observations from our 2+ months out here on the "Left Coast". I always thought this was where all the Hippies retired, but I was wrong. There are old Hippies here, but they seem to be on the smaller surounding "Gulf Islands", such as Saltspring and Hornby Islands.
Other things;
People here are really friendly, even the people who work in the stores and restaurants. Even the people at the Post Office.That still surprises us. Kinda like being in Tennessee, without the accents.
 A lot of people here burn their garbage. The whole household garbage/recycling shtick is so convoluted that people here just burn stuff. Especially "Up Island", which is anywhere north of Victoria.
 Nobody picks up their dog's poop. It is everywhere. Watch your step! In fairness, they do let their dogs drive them home from parties.
 People here say "Hey", instead of the standard Canadian "Eh". i.e.-"It's pretty cold out, hey"?
 Drugstores here are huge and you can buy anything in them.They're like a Best Buy,Shoppers Drug Mart and Zellers rolled into one.
 It's been 6˚C almost every day this month.That's pretty normal for January.

How did he work the stick without an opposable thumb?

   Soooooo, two good weeks of running, we are definitely looking for some races on the Island, but it looks like me might hafta hit the mainland for an Ultra. Gary Robbins has one in Squamish.  He just set a course record at the 100 mile H.U.R.T. in Hawaii, and he's from Newfoundland. Hey, maybe Ellie Greenwood and Tracy Garneau will be there?I know someone famous who will be running, Dora, who was recently featured in Canadian Running Magazine because of her strange "Caveman" diet.Pages 62-63.
  Or maybe I should just try to get to February without hurting myself.

People Shop In Scooters. This one is rain-proofed.

No Pressure. I Apologize in Advance for the Lameness of This Post. Nice Photos,Though.

Seagulls fighting over a "dead something". There's actually a bird out here called a "Jaeger" (German for hunter) that chases and harasses seagulls until they give up their food or vomit. True story.

 Normally, when I've done something this stupid, I  rush back into running too soon and hurt myself again and so on and so on. Oh, did I mention I gave myself "Turf Toe"?
  Long story short, my nephew plays soccer on an indoor artificial turf field. I was kicking the ball back and forth with him, and to demonstrate how superior my skills were (he's pretty good for an 8 year old) I unleashed a mighty kick at him, except instead of hitting the ball, I drove my toe into the turf and went limping off like a little baby.

A seal teases some seagulls in Qualicum Beach. He had a salmon he was flipping in the air, then he would go after the seagulls when they tried to steal some.

Anyhow,I forgot all about this until recently. I had thought my swollen foot and painful big toe was gout, but normally it goes away in a few days after changing my diet (cutting my beer consumption) and popping the NSAID's like Pez. If I could get my shoes on, I'd put up with the pain and go for a run.

Tide's coming in.

Things didn't click until we went to another soccer game, and I remembered the incident from before. A light bulb came on. "It's not gout, it's turf toe"! I'd had it before and remembered the pain.

Cameron Lake. I already have a run planned for here on an abandoned railway.

 So the cure for turf toe is R.I.C.E.  As all of us older runners know, that stands for Rest,Ice,Compression and Elevation. I can do that.

A Hooded Merganser visits the pond next door. I love the "Elvis" haircut.

The Merganser diving. That's bad news for the goldfish.

So it's been two days of rest and relaxation, we finally downloaded all our Christmas photos and tomorrow, we organize the office. Maybe. If we get time.

This is where we will Kayak when it warms up. People do kayak(and golf) all year here though.

We want to do some mountain climbing, and this is the first one on the list, Mt. Arrowsmith. You might be thinking like "Dream On", but we feel like we're on a "Permanent Vacation"....oh never mind. It's the tall peak behind the foothills.

It's wet here.

So for Christmas, we deep fried a turkey.

Before...Prepped and ready to go.

During

Now comes Miller time....

Done!

Coolest side dish ever, mashed potato snowmen. "The Girl" is trying to serve them up in one piece.

10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1, smile! I almost forgot, this is our Christmas portrait.

Anybody see a Hobbit?

Brad made an "appy" in the shape of a salmon. Cool.

I'm scared.....

Leftovers

The Boy got one with 3 eyes.

The excitement was too much for the 3 visiting mutts.

There is a unicorn farm here. They even have a "Unicorn Crossing" road sign.

Hey Moe!

  So we are getting settled, slowly but Shirley. I have my eye on a trail marathon in Moab, and it's not until November,so hopefully I'll be skinny Digger by then. Moab is one of the most amazing places I've ever been, and I think Portage would love it. Also, it will give us motivation to get in tip top shape.
 So,in the meantime, I am implementing a strict "No Beer until 5 P.M." rule.
I mean, it's not gout, after all.
Best thing about being retired? I just realized, I don't know what day it is today. Although I'm pretty sure it's either Wednesday or Thursday.
And don't call me Shirley.