Bear, Green, Bear

 

[caption id="attachment_281" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="Boulder as seen from the top of Bear Mtn"][/caption]

 

I intended to run up Bear Mtn and then Green but once I got up Green I had it in my head to beat the arriving thunderstorm cell that was visibly dumping rain over the valley to the west of the flatirons.   So, I got to the top of Bear twice and Green once.  I'm clearly out of shape when it comes to vertical running.  The endurance seems fine but there's just no "pop" or energy to bound UP the trails.  Regardless, I had a nice time and plan to hit at least one of the peaks every day for the next month or so.  I took some photos and two videos (one at the last stretch of Bear and one of the last stretch of Green), so I'll let them tell the short story of the run today.

Other than the sheer joy of the running, the nice part was meeting two guys from Denmark up on Green Mtn.  Knut (pronounced newt) and Jacob (yaycub) are nice guys and heavy runners.  Jacob asked me if I run ultras and I responded yes, but only up to 50 miles, as of now.  I asked if they did (run ultras) and Knut responded, "Yes, I run long distances."  So, I asked what kind of long distances and he responded with "250k's mostly".  Okeedokee.

The videos are shaky but the one up Green is sort of funny.  The worst part of the run was the second ascent of Bear.  The thunder and lightning were getting closer together, and closer to me but I pushed on and scrambled up to the true summit of Bear just as a bolt flash rocked me.  I don't mean the cute little static shock you get on shag carpeting but a to the bone shock that left me dazed with skin feeling fuzzy.  It scared me enough that I immediately dropped off the East side of Bear onto the sheer rock face where I traversed over to the trail and then flew down to the saddle and eased onto fern trail where I could relax a bit...  I've been electrocuted before and this was crazy.

Here's the first ascent of Bear Vid:

Here's the Green Vid:

 

[caption id="attachment_285" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="Green Mtn as seen from the top of Bear Mtn"][/caption]

 

 

[caption id="attachment_286" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="Knut and Jacob from Denmark"][/caption]

 

 

[caption id="attachment_287" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="Creepy guy on Fern trail photo. Yes, I used the wrong (too short) attachment to cut my hair this time."][/caption]

 

 

[caption id="attachment_289" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="The final scramble up to the peak of Bear Mtn"][/caption]

 

 

[caption id="attachment_290" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="The last photo up on Bear just after I got shocked to the bone by lightning and dropped over the east side of the peak."][/caption]