Middle Lane in Swim Class

My swim speed is improving! In class last week and this week coach bumped me up from the slowest lane to the middle one! We started class with 8 25's and for some of them I was swimming as fast as the folks in the fast lane! I did look at the clock and my first 25 was 30 seconds. I also did a 100 in about 2 minutes and 7 seconds. The Memphremagog time limit is supposed to be 4 minutes for the 200 - I'm going to set a goal to be able to do it in that time. It's harder to swim fast in cold water, but I feel like I'm getting the hang of the catch and the pull, and can move faster. 

North and South Baldface

I've been wanting to hike the Baldfaces since I read about them on the terrifying 25 - well, wanted to and didn't want to. The hike sounded really fun and also really hard, which it was. I decided that since it was almost a 3 hour drive to the trail I would try going up the night before, camping, and just driving 35 minutes to the trailhead. I stayed at the "Back 40" at this hostel in north conway - it wasn't bad, except that the "bathroom" was a bucket! I slept much better than I usually do the night before a big hike, and woke up at 7. But then I had to pack up my tent and all my stuff, and it was about 7:30 when I left. I stopped at a nearby cafe for coffee and a pastry and was on the road at about 7:45 and at the mountain at about 8:30. Which is earlier than if I had driven up, but later then it would have been if I stayed in the hostel. I think the camping idea is good for a shorter hike, but maybe not a big one like this.

Everything I read about the Baldfaces said not to hike them when wet because there are some slabby climbing bits. Sitting in my tent in the evening, listening to it rain, I planned out doing a hike next to the one I wound up doing - I would still like to do the alternate hike. But when I parked at the trailhead, there were a ton of people headed out to the hike, so I decided if they could do it, so could I! And that's what I did.

The hike starts out pretty flat, and then goes gradually uphill. For the first bit it's just a stroll in the woods. I took my time and enjoyed being out there - it was brisk but not cold and the leaves are starting to change. There is a little lean-to shelter that was super cute and would be nice to sleep in. I took a little break there and had a snack. That's when a bunch of people caught up to me (of course), because right after the shelter things got real. There are some ledges that you need to climb after the hut - they were all dry and quite manageable, but also about 1000 feet of elevation gain in less then a mile, which is a lot. 

It was quite a slog getting up the mountain - I didn't even take any photos. And, as soon as I got to the top, this cloud bank rolled in and blocked the view! Ugh! I did look like it was pretty fast moving, so I ate an orange and rested for a little bit before walking the ridgeline to the other baldface. I do love a ridgeline, and this was a good one! No views because of the clouds, but a really nice pine forest and tons of blueberry bushes. There was another 500 feet elevation gain to the top of the second mountain - pretty tiring TBH. When I got to the top of the second mountain, the fog rolled away and I got to enjoy the view as I ate. I had a delicious (though somewhat smushed) avocado and cheese sandwich on whole wheat bread and watched the clouds. 

After about a half hour I reluctantly left, thinking about how ephemeral hiking is. I mean, you work so hard to get to the top of the mountain, eat a sandwich, and then you have to hike back down. The way down was also steep, not like the way up, but the first mile or so there was a lot of butt scootching. I took Bucknell Ridge trail, and really enjoyed the viewpoints. I got to look at South Baldface at multiple points on the way down, and be impressed with myself for hiking up it. 

The best part of the hike was the Emerald Pool at the end. It's a pretty deep pool at the base of a small waterfall, and with the way the light falls on it, it does look pretty green. My feet were killing me, and I was all kinds of sweaty, so I started by sticking my feet in, but soon realize that wouldn't be good enough, and stripped down to my underware for a dip. The water was so nice - pretty chilly and clear. After just a couple minutes my feet felt better and I felt great. I didn't stay in that long because I still had .75 mile to hike, and I didn't want to get hypothermia. Also, I was in a popular pool in my underware. Best 2 minutes of the day, though!

I finished my hike, got to the parking lot, changed into clean clothes and just needed one last pee before leaving. There was an outhouse, but no one was there, it smelled really bad, and there was this really nice tree.  Of course, just as I squatted down this guy came flying at me on a mountain bike. I did a funny hop around the tree, in squat position, but I still think I flashed him a little. Usually I have such good pee karma! In the end the hike was 10 miles, 3455 feet elevation gain and 7 hrs and 15 min moving. It was fun, especially the ledges, and I would do it again, but also it was no joke.

Biking in Croatia

For vacation this year I joined a big group with a friend on a packaged tour biking in Croatia. I wasn't totally sure about this, because there were 22 of us and that's a lot of people for me to be nice to, but it wound up being a really terrific trip! I went with VBT, which was so lux - they did everything for us including booking my flights. Also, I had an ebike, which was the best! We biked on two of the Dalmatian islands - Brac and Hvar, and they were pretty hilly. With the ebike, though, it was no problem. I also swam in the sea every day, ate a lot of ice cream, and had other wonderful food. 

The trip started with a day in Split, where I had my first swim and walked around a few historic sights. The time difference is 6 hours - I slept a little on the flight there, but was pretty tired, so the first night I got into bed at 8 pm and fell right to sleep. I wound up sleeping for 10 hours, and woke up on Croatia time. The second day we met our tour guides (totally awesome, of course) and took a ferry over to Brac. Our hotel was right on the ocean and we had a balcony! The water in the Aegean sea is so clear and blue, I loved being able to just jump in at any time. We also got our bikes on the first day in Brac, and my bike was soooo much better than a blue bike or my ll bean bike, it was such a pleasure to ride. Our first ride was just a 6 mile loop to get used to the biking, and I was totally stoked to find myself ahead of the pack while just riding a normal speed. That held true for the entire trip - I was always up front and loved the biking so much.

The two big days of biking on Brac we went to an Olive Oil Museum (which I thought was a little silly when I heard about it, but actually turned out to be really interesting, and they gave us samples which were delicious) and to a stone cutting school which was so hot I mostly just wanted the tour to be over. It was in the 90's the first couple of days, and everywhere was hot, except biking because of the breeze. And the sea, of course. We also went to a dinner hosted by a local family, and I had some of the best gnocchi ever - I'm going to try to make some here I'm pretty sure. 

We took a small boat to Hvar after three nights, which was a non-biking day. We got to spend time at this amazing beach and eat more ice cream. In Hvar we went to a fortress and then walked down to town to our next hotel. This one wasn't on the sea, but there was a view from the window, and we had a suite with 2 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms, so no sharing required! The biking on Hvar was even hillier than Brac, but the uphill was pretty slow and steady, and with the ebike it wasn't a problem at all. I loved poking around in some of the shops and eating some really delicious food. I also felt pretty good about myself because most of the women decided not to bike on the hills. On our last day of biking we wound up at this amazing beach, with an inflatable bouncy park that one woman and I did, and some cliffs (low - like 6 feet high) to jump off of. I was already done swimming and dressed by the time we got to the cliff, but it looked so nice that I stripped down to my underware and jumped in :)

We ended the tour in Dubrovnik, where I walked around the walls of the old city and had some really delicious food. The town was really amazing, but so touristy in the old city - I wasn't sad that I only had an afternoon there. We flew out from Dubrovnik, and it was the first time that the weather was anything other than sunny and hot - there was a wind storm that caused our flight to be delayed by 4 hours, which meant we missed our next flight and had to spend a night in Zurich. Happily, we got vouchers to stay at a hotel (instead of like last year, when I had to sleep on the airport floor). Still, it was a taxing flight home, and I was exhausted and jetlagged after. We flew lufthansa on the way there, and swiss on the way back - definitely recommend lufthansa over swiss - seats were just a little bigger and more comfy. Two thumbs up on Croatia - it's becoming a real tourist destination, and I can see why.