Saturday, October 6, 2007

Exploring...

Today I felt like checking out some different trails in the area, so rather than running the usual ones in Pt. Mugu State Park, this morning we drove just a bit further down PCH to Leo Carrillo State Park & Beach in Malibu. Actually Chris dropped me off a few miles up Mulholland so I could do a point-to-point via the Malibu Springs Trail. On the way I "bagged" most of the trails all the way down to the beach, for a total of around 10 miles. Except for the first 1.9 miles of the MST which were quite overgrown, once again reminding me that California flora is not nearly as forgiving (read: I got owies) as that on the East Coast--the trails were as nice as those in PMSP, with the final descent of the Nicholas Flat Trail (it wasn't flat; it led to one) reminiscent of the fab Ray Miller in PMSP. And what a gorgeous day to be in the mountains: sunny, clear skies, temps barely hitting 70, 3 deer sighted, and only 4 hikers encountered. I even ran by a pond, a rarity in Southern California! My legs are finally starting to feel "springy" again. :)

Views from the trail. Kind of amazing that this is only about 1/2 hour north of LA.

6 comments:

Jamie Anderson said...

Looks like a beautiful area. I bet there's a lot to explore where you live.

Steve Pero said...

Looks nice, Sue....back here it's been gloomy and raining all week. Typical of what it will be like for the next 6 months :-(
I miss New Mexico...and will go back to live in the same area someday.

Steve

Olga said...

I, too, always amazed how close beautiful areas are to where I live:)

Anonymous said...

Thats California! LOL. Just kidding Sue. Those pictures are great. Someday I want to get out to the west coast and do some serious running. Until then I'll just settle for the rocks and roots and hills of Kansas. Here in the next couple of weeks I'll get out to some of my favorite places and get some good pics to put on my blog.

RunSueRun said...

Yeah, believe it or not, CA is much more than freeways and people. :p

Hey David, I *need* to live where there are mtns., but one of the most beautiful sunsets I ever witnessed was over the Kansas prairie on the Heartland 100 course!

Anonymous said...

Agreed. We had a beautiful one this year as the storm clouds were moving out around the time the sun was going down. With Paul Dewitt racing the sun back in as he came through our aide station. He almost caught it too.