“Do you think we should turn around and run somewhere else? This is crazy,” I said as my death trap of a car made its way fairly nicely (for once) down the snowy curvy road. “Nah, let’s go back and get my car!” Stonegate offers … done!
Weekend long runs are always an adventure but throw in some snowy conditions in an area that doesn’t typically get snow, paired with just my friend Stonegate and well, anything can happen.
Before we turned around to get Stonegate’s car, we pulled off the side of the road to discuss our options. We just happened to stop at the gates to the “Safari Estates,” a place we’ve passed a million times. The Rhino just looked so lonely and cold in the snow. We gave him some love.
We were only about a half hour off our intended schedule but we had no plans or obligations tying us anywhere today so we wanted to be safe rather than stuck. The snow wasn’t letting up either.
We changed our plans slightly and parked at the Cool Fire Station rather than trying to navigate the windy roads down to the confluence. We were also trying to avoid the Fourmidable races that were happening today as well but did not succeed there.
Our first few steps were met with mud. The kind of mud that’s about to rip off your shoe and makes that slurping noise as you try so hard to keep from losing it. The crazy part is that it was a mix of snow and mud so half the time we were stepping in what we thought was just snow and was actually a covered up quagmire.
Oddly, it was not THAT cold outside. Sure there was snow on the ground, but I was in shorts and I wasn’t cold. My toes however, were soaked but even that eventually subsided the more we tried to run.
It was so beautiful though. We don’t get snow like this often here in Northern California, maybe every 7 or 8 years it seems and definitely not this much.
We were also the only two crazy people out there for a while. We just ran, jumped over what we could and laughed. We took a million photos between us. Eventually we reached No Hands Bridge and saw the aid-station volunteers set up for the Fourmidable Half Marathon and 35k that was happening.
We made our way over to the Confluence and started running. The snow was still falling but quickly changing to rain. Here we ran into quite few people out just experiencing the crazy weather, taking photos, going for a walk etc.
We were like two kids in a candy store with the snow. I was trying super hard not to slip in it (been there, done that and was out from running for a while) but it was everywhere!
The rest of the afternoon was spent bombing downhills, avoiding puddles and crossing waterfalls. It slowly got warmer too. I had ditched my hood pretty early on and packed away my gloves as well.
We had a set mileage in our head but realized the trail conditions were not exactly stellar and decided we’d take it a few miles at a time. Once the snow and rain stopped, the sun came out!
That view above stopped me dead in my tracks. “Oh wow, that looks like Ireland!” I said to Stonegate. Have I been to Ireland? Um, nope! I just assume that’s what it looks like. 🙂 With the sun making its way out, the snow had melted adding even more mud and water to the trails.
We decided to make our way back to Cool and it was then that we realized we would be running into the traffic of the Fourmidable racers as they made their way back to No Hands Bridge.
In a way, this was kind of nice. We’d pull off to the side, letting them pass as safely as they could in the muddy conditions. Some still had smiles on their faces, some looked like they were pretty done for the day. Stonegate and I just clapped and cheered. We told them they were total bada$$ runners for being out there.
The route back to Cool is uphill. We avoided K2 because that was the course the runners had to take and well, we were certain it was probably a wet dangerous mess. Instead we opted to go up rollercoaster, continued to cheer on runners and stop in the waterfalls.
Pretty certain that was the last image of my shoes being clean because after rollercoaster we headed straight into the muddy gully trails that lead you back to the fire station.
The snow as you can see, had cleared from the trails but was still covering the grass making everything look so pretty.
See what I mean about my shoes? 🙂 The trails leading back to the fire station were even worse. It was hilarious, slurp slurp “I almost lost my shoe!”
Overall, it was a perfect day. Even though the intended route and plan did not happen, we still ran some crazy miles and more importantly, had a great time out there.
At some point that morning, I had texted Vans to let him know that I had brought the car back home but was heading back out there to run. I told him about the snow and so he took the girls when they woke up to find some.
When Stonegate dropped me off, this was sitting in my driveway ….
Not bad for a Sunday fun-day. 🙂 Snowmageddon 2019.
Happy Trails!
~Trailmomma
