Missoula Half Marathon

This is the 3rd consecutive year that I've worked a week plus long vacation into a state running trip.  2008 was the Great Alaskan Maritime Marathon cruise and 2009 was a 3 Hawaiian island adventure.  My 2010 trip was a tour of 3 National Parks with the Missoula 1/2 Marathon tucked in between.

Yellowstone National Park

Yellowstone North Entrance Roosevelt Arch

I flew into Bozeman, Montana Tuesday morning and drove to Yellowstone's north entrance near Gardiner, MT.  My first stop was Mammoth Hot Springs in the Northwest corner of the Grand Loop:

Travertine at Mammoth Terraces

After a mile hike of boardwalk and asphalt trails, I headed to the Canyon Village area to check into my base camp for the next 2 nights at Cascade Lodge:

After checking in and grabbing a bite to eat, I proceeded to drive to the North Rim trails of the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone.  The first trail I took was the short but 600 foot drop via switchbacks trail to the brink of the Lower Falls.  I took a pic of the trail the next morning while hiking the South Rim trails.

Brink of Lower Falls Trail as seen from Uncle Toms Trail.

I then took in views of the Lower Falls from another steep drop in the Red Rock Point trail, followed by Lookout Point and Grand View overlooks.

View of Lower Falls from Red Rock Point

Wednesday was my biggest hiking day; I logged around 20 miles hiking.  I also learned my first lesson of the trip: cotton socks don't mix with hiking.  I ended up with blisters at the end of the day.  Luckily, they didn't bother my 1/2 marathon run a few days later.  I did an 8 mile hike that started at the Wapiti trailhead, going through Hayden Valley, Clear Lake, Lily Pad Lake and then joining the South Rim trails looping  back to the car.  There were a ton of interesting geothermal features between Clear and Lily Lakes.  The sound of this one was pretty incredible.


After heading back to Cascade Lodge for a quick break, I drove to Dunraven Pass and hiked 6 miles roundtrip to the top of Mt. Washburn.  The views at the 10243 summit were pretty amazing.  Unfortunately, the camera stayed in the car.  I did have my cellphone camera to get a couple of shots.  I then headed to the Lake Area of the Grand Loop where I hiked the Elephant Back and Storm Point Loop trails.  Elephant Back climbed 800 feet to yield an incredible view of Yellowstone Lake and the Lake Hotel.  That got me to 20 miles and blisters on both feet.

Grand Teton National Park

One of the reasons I hiked 20 miles the day before was to try and buy time to be able to head to the sister park of Yellowstone just south of it.  As I checked out of Canyon Village that morning, I figured it would be a good day to head to GTNP to get in 6 miles or so hiking.  I didn't want to go much farther due to the blister issues.  I used Body Glide prior to putting on, yes, cotton socks again.  After driving around in the park for a bit, I wound up at the Jenny Lake area and ended up hiking to the split of Cascade Canyon.  I pretty much failed in my 6 mile max attempt as the round trip hike was right around 13 miles.  Still, it was totally worth the extra miles to take in the great views of the mountains and waterfalls along the way.

After the hike, I headed back to Yellowstone to check in at the Old Faithful Inn for the next 2 nights of my trip.  Friday morning I went on a ranger led hike to Fairy Falls in the Old Faithful area of the Grand Loop.  I enjoyed the slower pace of the ranger led hike as well as the interpretive aspects provided by the ranger.  The hike included a couple of geyers as well as a view of Grand Prismatic Spring.  Following lunch, I hiked the Observation Point loop to see Old Faithful erupt away from the crowds.  A quick trip to Artist Paint Pots in the Norris area wrapped up Friday and my Yellowstone hiking.

Grand Prismatic Spring

Artist Paint Pots
The Race

2010 continues to be the year of underwhelming races, uninspired training, and just a general running funk.  The good news is that I completed running a 1/2 marathon in my 43rd state last Sunday at the "Runner's World Readers' Overall Top Ranked Marathon".  I can't remember exactly how many times I heard or saw that phrase printed over the weekend but believe me it was milked for all it was worth.  I really just had to scratch my head over that one and ask WHY?  I don't think I'd rank the race in my top 10 1/2 marathon events that I've attended much less rank it anywhere near New York, Chicago, or heck, even Houston marathons.  I don't know if the questions that led to the rankings were biased or what, but while not a bad event, this just wasn't anything to write home about. 
One other factoid that was repeated several times by the 1/2 prerace announcer was the fact that Texas had the 5th most participants in the event.  Considering how far Texas is from Montana, that is a pretty impressive stat for the Lone Star state.
I ended up getting my time back under 2 hours after 3 straight finishes over 2 hours.  I was pleased considering I hadn't run a weekend long run since my Medicine Bow 1/2 marathon at the end of May.

Glacier National Park

Post race, I made the 2 plus hour drive from Missoula to Glacier National Park.  I don't know if Glacier was so crowded because it is celebrating its 100th anniversary  this year, but the park just felt incredibly packed.  I wasn't able to find a parking spot at the first 2 places I tried visiting when I first got into the park. 

My plan for Glacier was to stay near the Lake McDonald area Sunday afternoon then drive to Logan Pass and beyond Monday for a longer hike.  Not finding parking spots near Lake McD brought me up to Logan Pass on the Going to the Sun Road Sunday afternoon.  Ever since driving the Road to Hana in Maui last year, I compare great drives to it.  Going to the Sun Road is Montana's version of the Road to Hana.  Driving along the mountainside afforded incredible views.  I got up to Logan Pass, found a parking spot and attempting to hike a couple of trails in the area.  Logan Pass was very crowded Sunday afternoon.  The trails were over 90% snow covered so I didn't hike very much up there.  I wasn't prepared to hike in snow so I just got a feel for the area and then decided to head back to Lake McDonald to check in at the Lodge there.

Lake McDonald Lodge view lakeside

The Lodge was built in the early 1900s before Going to the Sun road was complete.  The Lodge faced the Lake as boat transportation was the primary means of transportation at the time.  With GTTS road completed, you now enter the lodge from the rear. 

As I drove to Logan Pass Sunday afternoon, I opted for a ranger led tour of Avalanche Lake in the Lake McDonald area Monday morning.  Again, the ranger provided insight and led an enjoyable tour to the lake.

Tuesday was a travel day with me leaving Glacier at 6:00 am for a 5 plus hour drive to Bozeman.  I then connected through Denver getting back to IAH in Houston after 10:30.  All in all, a great trip to log by 43rd state.  I've got 3 repeat states on tap for the rest of the year.  2 more states scheduled for 2011 on my quest to run them all!