#49 - Run a Ragnar

When we were strangers.

I don't know what to say about this experience.  Mostly because, if you're not Van 2, does it even matter?  But here are some forced words about it:

We make good decisions together.  Sometimes.

Ragnar SoCal was 194 miles this year.  We ran from Huntington Beach to San Diego (the convention center), skipping Camp Pendleton (though driving through it on our way there).  12 people, 2 vans.  

I wanted to do a Ragnar.  Somehow Vanessa was easily convinced.  We tried to form our own team.  We failed.  We followed the Ragnar SoCal facebook page and found a nice, young gentleman named Terry looking for a couple more runners for his team.  So we joined them.  So 30ish hours in a van with 4 people we wouldn't know and another van of 6 people we also didn't know.  Then more people dropped out.  So Vanessa invited her friend Alex.  And then some magic happened and everything was eventually covered.

The leg lengths kept changing, so I expected something around 14/15 miles but ended up with around 12 spread out over 3 legs.  That was probably good because I'm already slow and I did not train appropriately.  I had that half-marathon attitude of "whatever, I know I can finish, so training just makes it hurt less," which was not the best tactic in a team event.  In team events, I tend to push myself a bit more, and that meant a bit more hurt.  And I still loved it.

Van 2 for Life

So back to the timeline.  I picked up VV and Alex around 9:00am on Friday.  We drove up to Encinitas to meet the van, arranged by our fearless captain Terry, and were introduced to our teammate AJ.  Much of the conversation for the next 20 minutes was about the movie Frozen, which Vanessa, Alex, and I had not yet seen.  We packed up then picked up our 12th / 6th of our van, Wes, at Pendleton.  He hadn't seen Frozen either.

Terry gettin' tatted up.

Inked

We got to the first major exchange around noon and hung out until our 6th runner, Lydia, from Van 1, arrived.  We mulled around, listened to a painful safety speech, saw some weird costumes, and confirmed we were just Not That Kind of Team (NTKOT).  We applied tattoos.  Some came off.  Some were reapplied.  Some more went on.

Van 1 coming in hot for the first major exchange.

Eventually around 2pm Wes took off for the 7th team leg of around 10 miles.  He killed 23 other runners and then passed off to Vanessa who passed off to me who passed off to AJ who passed off to Alex who passed off to Terry who passed it back to Van 1 at Doheny State Beach.  Somewhere in there I had a perfect life moment: We were in the van; I was already loving being part of a team, had had a nice first leg, then my favorite song came on the radio, then the view of strip malls melted into the hills and the ocean.  Beautiful.

Then we ate some Chipotle, drove to Oceanside, decided to sleep, failed, decided not sleep, had a total tease of a bedtime story, didn't sing Journey at the top of our lungs, learned some facts about the Paleo diet, learned some Disney theories, put on reflective equipment, and then Wes started us off again around 12:30am.  Then Vanessa (with guest star AJ).  My leg was through Vista at 2:30am.  It was sketchy and dark and lonely and had a few sprinkles.  Then AJ.  Then Alex.  Then Terry.

Second major exchange.

My night exchange.

Then we drove to the Gliderport in LaJolla.  And we slept.  Super uncomfortably.  For what, 2-3 hours?  Still without a bedtime story.

Waiting.  Again.

I was SO HAPPY to see AJ.

Then we meandered around.  Hung out.  Stretched, foam rolled, Tiger tailed.  Then Wes took off again.  Then Vanessa.  Then me (through PB, mostly on the crowded boardwalk).  Then my fav pics of the event happened during my hand off to AJ.  Then there was a pause for the not-currently-running folks to stretch and chill in Tecolote Park with Special Guest the String Cheese I Forgot I'd Brought, which ultimately earned me Saint status.  (Yes, women can be saints.  I learned so much this event.)  Then Alex, who had to run that flippin Narragansett hill from OB to Point Loma.  So mean.  Then Terry finished the whole team from Liberty Station to the Convention Center.

Last hand off!

We searched for our team.  Found them.  Fake finished as a group.  Took some photos.  Eventually had some beers.  Drove back to Encinitas.  Cleaned out the vans.  Drove back.  I dropped V & Alex off and then went out to Stone Liberty Station for some not-at-all-needed drinks.  Then Jessica & Elizabeth came by to finally bust open that scotch my bro sent me since I hadn't found a good-enough excuse for it before.

We finished 57 out of 510 Open Mixed Teams and 106 out of 724 total teams with a time of 29 hours, 18 minutes, and 10.6 seconds.  That includes the hour-ish van delay at one of the checkpoints that didn't have enough parking.  30 hours and 194 miles from Huntington Beach to San Diego: I am so proud of NTKOT.  

I'd try to convince you all that this was all way more fun than I can explain, but you'd never believe me if you aren't Van 2.  Van 2 4 life.

Winners (at Life)

#2 - Take a Road Trip to Somewhere New

The road trip fully entailed a drive out to the Salton Sea detailed in the previous post about my camping trip, but the ride home was certainly more eventful than the trip there.

Our first stop on the way home was Bombay Beach, a once popular tourist destination in the 60's that was hit by hurricanes in back-to-back years.  Yes, hurricanes.  There are still folks who live there but there are also still the remains of washed-out homes and trailers from the 70's.  It's spooky.

Our second stop was Salvation Mountain.  Salvation Mountain is a strange place that an artist created with mounds of trash, hay bales, adobe mud, and paint.  It's visited by strange people.  It's surrounded by Slab City with is a bit of an off-the-grid living environment in the middle of the desert.  Chris MacCandless wrote about it in his diaries and it was featured in Jon Krakauer's book and later the movie Into the Wild.  The volunteer at Salvation Mountain told us we had just missed a rager of a "prom" the previous night, where men dressed in tuxedos or tuxedo t-shirts and women in ball gowns, some they come wearing, and some they select from the racks of donated dresses available.  He told us that it was cool though because they were having an end-of-the-season party the following weekend we were welcome to attend.  Thanks, homie.  It was super strange but I loved every minute of it.














Then we headed home.  I'm sunburned and happy.

The last stop was for gas and milkshakes in Pine Valley.  Delish.

#50 - Go Camping. For Real This Time.

Our campsite.

Remember that time I bitched about how often I'd had the "You've Never Been Camping?!" conversation?

Me too, and guess what?  I WILL NEVER HAVE IT AGAIN.

I am so excited.

I am so excited never to have that conversation again that I'm having trouble focusing on just how fantastic my first camping experience was.


Since no one ever followed through with organizing an actual camping trip with me, I found another route to get myself into a sleeping bag on the ground in the middle of no where.  I asked Mark Ceder if I could be his teaching assistant for his Outdoor Leadership course at the University of San Diego.  He graciously accepted even though my outdoor experience did not include any camping or real outdoor overnight experience at all.

One component of the course is a class camping trip.  We debated a bit on where to go and landed on the Salton Sea in the Sonoran Desert in California.

The Salton Sea is a weird place.  A WEIRD PLACE.

We left USD around 5pm on a Friday and drove to the desert in a van with a trailer full of kayaks.  We got some looks.  We stopped at El Centro for some In and Out and made it to our camp site around 10pm.

We set up our tents by the light of headlamps and had some s'mores around the fire.  Emily and I decided that the 4-person tent looked a little squishy for 4 actual people, so we set up our own and then had no idea how 4 people would fit in a tent that size.  Until we got up in the morning and realized that we had set up a 2-person tent that was half the size of what everyone else was sleeping in.

I don't have much to say about sleeping in a tent except that I really don't mind it it all... as long as I'm not 400 yards from train tracks of a line that runs regularly all night.

Mark, Scott, and Weston cooked us a lovely breakfast of scrambled eggs with peppers and hash browns with apples that the 10 of us enjoyed all together around the picnic table.

Then we headed out on a hike of the Painted Canyon.  The rock was in a variety of colors but those browns, blacks, whites, and grays were the only colors in the Painted Canyon since it's the desert.  So that was weird for me.  But there was a bit of variety of terrain in that we entered in the canyon, climbed some ladders, headed through some slot canyons, found ourselves on a ridge, and then hiked down into a wash for lunch and then the trek out.  I really like hiking and it was fun to chat with some of the students I hadn't gotten to know as well.  Retroactively, I really liked that Mark kept vowing to jump into the Salton Sea when we got back.  A ranger had stopped by in the morning and announced how refreshing the water was.

After 4-5 hours on the trail, we stopped by the visitor's center for a short video about the weird place we were in.  Then we headed back to camp for some down time.  Mark convinced a couple students to join him in his swim, so I followed them to the shore with my camera.  (Because of my professional background, I don't really enjoy recreational swimming.  I definitely don't enjoy it in waters that have substantial warnings about eating the fish that come out of them.)

We quickly found a pile of decomposing fish.  Then we walked across what should have been sand but was really just crushed up fish vertebrae that are extremely uncomfortable to walk on and get into flip flops very easily.  Then, at the shore, we noticed how snotty the water looked and the film that seemed to lie across the edge of the sea.  It was disgusting.  We stood around and commented for awhile.  Then we headed back to the site.  I accidentally stepped in a marshy section of fish bones and got the nasty fish water on my feet, which then made the fish bones stick to it more.  Gross.

Everyone washed up and then we had a delightful burrito dinner, and, in true California style, that included avocado, cilantro, limes, and Tapatio.  Obviously.

Then we lit a fire, Mark made us apple cobbler.  We played Hot Seat.  I loved how open everyone was to sharing, even some difficult stories.

The next morning we got up for a sunrise paddle (kayak) on the sea.  However, once we were up, Mark informed us that it was way too windy so we should go back to sleep and we'd go for just a quick paddle from the Visitor's Center back to camp in a bit.

That was awesome.

We had bagels and fruit for breakfast.  Then we headed to the Visitor's Center.  We had a quick paddle school at the boat launch and then spent some time practicing in the marina, which it was pretty calm.  Then we headed out to the sea, which was not calm.  It went really well, except for every time someone got sprayed or splashed with sea water, there was a cry of disgust.  We got to camp in about 10 minutes and checked kayaking in the Salton Sea of our lists.


We packed up and headed out.  See #2 - Road Trip Somewhere New for the fantastic tales of the trip home.