Riding out the back door: May 2014

After a slow start to my mountain biking season, May has turned out to be a pretty good month. I’ve been getting out two or even three times a week all month, mostly on the trails out my back door. I’ve logged a couple rides on the Luther Forest trails (three actually), but haven’t hit Spier Falls or SMBA yet (that should change this week).

K-P night patrol

There’s a lot of things I love about skiing, but at the root of it all is the simple joy of being out in the woods, in the snow. The nicer the snow, the bigger my smile. And when the snow is good around home, my favorite thing to do is to head out the back door for a tour of the woods that surround our house on my cross-country skis. But the short daylight hours of mid-winter and my job in Albany make it difficult to get out in the snow as much as I’d like, so when the snow is good I grab my headlamp and go on night patrol.

Connecting the dots: Two new local trails

New York State’s recent acquisition of 200 acres adjoining Moreau State Park was highlighted last week in both the Saratogian and the Times Union as an important link in an eventual long-distance Palmertown Ridge Trail that would link Moreau State Park and Saratoga Springs. That trail could ultimately connect to the Zim Smith, creating an “alternative Northway” spanning Saratoga County north to south. Very cool. Here’s a look at two more recently opened trails that enhance another long-distance trail network just outside of Saratoga Springs.

Wilton Wildlife Preserve and Park, Frawley Trail. Last summer and fall, volunteer trail crews marked and cleared more than a mile of trail connecting WWPP’s Fox parcel trailhead on Route 50 (see accompanying map or click here) to Ruggles Road. The new trail traverses land (the Frawley parcel) that was added to WWPP in 2011 and represents a key linkage that could ultimately be made between WWPP’s core parcels (Fox, Old Gick Farm, Camp Saratoga and Opdahl Farm) and additional protected parcels south of King Road (the Neilmann and Kalabus-Perry parcels and other adjoining protected lands).

Camp Saratoga 5K trail series 2012 wrap-up

Monday night was the final race in the Camp Saratoga 5K trail series. My primary personal goal for the series this year was to shave a couple minutes off last year’s cumulative time for the 5 races. I improved by 3 minutes, a result I'm pretty happy with. The comparison to 2010 - my first year back running after 6 or 7 years off - really shows the value of cumulative training miles over time:

A tougher goal was to see if I could be the “fastest old guy” – in other words, nobody older than me finishing ahead of me. While I hit that in one or two of the races, there’s an awful lot of fit and fast runners out there in the 50+ age bracket.

Camp Saratoga 5K trail race series 2012

Near ideal conditions Monday night allowed me to log a solid time (22:08) for the first race of the Saratoga Stryders' 5K trail race series at the Wilton Wildlife Preserve & Park. Not a PR for me on that course (I ran it faster twice last summer), but not far off.

It's amazing how many variables contribute to a runner's outcome in any given race. On Monday evening my legs felt strong, I was reasonably well rested, I hadn't eaten anything I regretted earlier in the day, the weather was a coolish 72 degrees, the trail surfaces were firm and slightly damp. But my head was foggy and I wanted the race to be over before it even started. When the starting gun went off (actually just a "Go!") the first several hundred yards was congested and I had trouble getting around other runners and establishing a good pace. Halfway through the first mile I settled into a comfortable race pace and got my focus back. I didn't concern myself with my 1- and 2-mile splits, and was somewhat surprised when I finished at just over 22 minutes.

National Trails Day events: June 2

This Saturday, June 2, is the 20th annual National Trails Day. A number of local organizations have scheduled volunteer trail work projects and events to introduce people to natural places. Following is a partial list:

Wilton Wildlife Park & Preserve, Scout Road, 10am – 3pm. WWPP’s Lupine Festival will be held at their Camp Saratoga parcel and is expected to coincide with the peak of the wild blue lupine bloom and the first brood of Karner blue butterflies for 2012. Events include nature walks led by DEC and Nature Conservancy personnel and presentations with live local reptiles, amphibians, and birds of prey. Children’s activities include nature craft projects and pond exploration with dipping nets. The recently restored Cornell Hill fire tower will be open. Check their website for directions and a complete list of activities.

Wild blue lupine

Camp Saratoga 5K Trail Race Series wrap-up

Monday night was the final race in the Saratoga Stryders' Camp Saratoga 5K trail race series. Before the race even started, I knew I had essentially no chance of winning the Ironman Award for the fastest cumulative time over the 5 races. I was in sixth place after 4 races, and even though attrition plays a big role, I would need the 3 or 4 fastest guys to stay home to have even a fighting chance. But the Ironman Award was never my goal anyway – like most runners my only real goal was to run my best time.

Camp Saratoga 5K Trail Race Series: 06/27/2011

Monday night was the first in a series of five 5K trail races hosted by the Saratoga Stryders. Although I intend to run all five races, I don’t expect I’ll post a report after each one – this post is meant as a plug for the upcoming races as much as a report from Monday’s race.

80 to 100 runners typically show up for each race, and it’s about as fun and low-key as a race can be: no chips or bibs, a shouted “GO” for the start, a hand-held stopwatch for timing and numbered popsicle sticks for the finish. Monday evening’s event drew around a hundred runners.

Current Issues and Events

Several issues of importance to those with an interest in skiing and outdoor recreation in the Adirondacks have been in the news this week.

Proposed ban of gasoline motors on Thirteenth Lake. Last week, DEC released for comments a proposed regulation banning gasoline powered motorboats on Thirteenth Lake. Under the proposed regulation, electric trolling motors would be allowed. The proposal represents an excellent compromise that preserves access for sportsmen and the mobility impaired, yet also protects nesting loons and enhances the environment of the lake and surrounding wilderness. You can add your voice to others in support of this proposed regulation by contacting the DEC prior to July 2.

Thirteenth Lake

WWPP Update and Chat with the Executive Director

One of the great things about living in the Saratoga / Glens Falls region is the easy access to outdoor recreation. The Adirondacks are just stone's throw away, but there are some amazing outdoor resources literally out the back door. If you live in or near Saratoga and don't already know about the Wilton Wildlife Preserve and Park, its outdoor recreation opportunities and interesting ecology, you need to get introduced. The lupine is in bloom and the first hatch of Karner blue butterflies are emerging, so now is a great time to visit.

WWPP has been featured in several news stories recently, including pieces in The Saratogian and the Times Union about the restored fire tower that was dedicated recently, and a pair of pieces I wrote for Spirit of Saratoga (a monthly magazine published by The Saratogian) last month. The Spirit of Saratoga pieces don't link well, so they're reprinted below:

Oasis for Butterflies, Wildlife, People

Many area residents are familiar with the Wilton Wildlife Preserve & Park for its recreational opportunities, but some may not realize that those protected lands and open spaces owe their existence to the presence of a small, but strikingly beautiful, endangered butterfly. The Karner blue butterfly once inhabited a broad geographic range from Maine to Minnesota and north into Canada, but now exists in just a few locations in the northeast. In the mid-1990s, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, The Nature Conservancy, and the Town of Wilton partnered to form the Wilton Wildlife Preserve & Park (WWPP) with the goal of not only preserving habitat for the Karner blue butterfly, but also providing recreational and educational opportunities for people. Since that time, approximately 2400 acres of land has been protected with 14 miles of trails for recreational use, and WWPP now supports the largest population of Karner blues in the northeast.

Snow!

We woke up this morning to snow coming down at 1 to 2 inches per hour, and I wanted to get out on my cross country skis before the snow got too deep. I've been out on the Kalabus-Perry trail a few more times on skis and snowshoes since I wrote about it last month, and this morning I made a quick circuit past some interesting terrain that the K-P accesses.

Hardwood glade, about 150' vertical

Dual XC Tours: 01/23/2011

This past Sunday, family commitments kept us close to home. On days like that Beth and I sometimes each get in a quick nordic workout on trails near home by skiing one at a time, in shifts, while the other stays home with the kids: dual cross country ski tours. Beth did a 3.5 mile circuit of the groomed trails at the Wilton Wildlife Park and Preserve's nearby Scout Road parcel, while I opted for a woods tour through Saratoga County forestland that I can access right at the end of our block.

You can read more about my tour in a guest trip report here.

Lupine & Lady's Slippers

At the end of the last ice age, between 10 and 20 thousand years ago, the continental ice sheet that covered Gore Mountain, Whiteface and the Adirondacks receded. As the ice melted, water became impounded in a massive lake known as Glacial Lake Albany that covered the region from Glens Falls to Albany. Eventually that water drained away, but it left behind large deposits of sand and silt. Today, the sandy soil provides essential habitat for blue lupine – the only plant that the larvae of the endangered Karner blue butterfly feed on.