Day 137 September 20, 2011 Foot of the Rockies to Sunshine Village, Banff National Park 68km
24 Sep
Welcome to the mountains
Today was freezing, literally; it was -3! I wore tons of clothes this morning, including a bella clava thanks to the biting wind. Mike started running with me this morning and refused to allow me to say I was in the mountains until they surrounded us on all sides (but I told myself I was anyway way before that).
As the morning wore on it actually got colder thanks to the massive headwind. I’m not sure how long this headwind is going to last but it can’t last forever in the mountains I don’t think and I’m looking forward to it ending.
Yesterday towards the end of the day I came upon Scott Lake Pass, which was a bit bizarre seeing as I had only climbed a short hill. There was a sign reading 1410 meters, which means that Calgary is already pretty high in elevation. The strange thing is that this was the only sign I saw all day yesterday and today with an elevation marked on it but my watch had me at higher elevation at other points during today.
As I came into Canmore Alex Bauer, a friend of mine from high school cycled up to meet me. I ran and he cycled and we caught up a bit before he had to head back for work. It was great seeing him again.
Alex left right at the exit to Banff National Park, and shortly after entering another friend of mine, Katrina Donald, drove by. She wasn’t able to stop but gave a good honk. There was a nice path that ran all along the side of the highway allowing me to run an not have to pay attention to traffic, which was a nice change. I did have to pay attention to cyclists though and there were a ton of those.
The stretch after lunch took a long time and I had to take frequent breaks. The afternoon definitely dragged on so at one point Dave, Russ and Mike snuck off to get ice cream for when I was finished. Russ jumped out and ran with me towards the end, as did Dave, but I only managed to make 68km despite wanting to get to 70km. A little disappointing but close enough to my goal that…
Tomorrow I should make it to BC!
