IAT FKT Days 3 & 4

Day 3: It’s amazing what a little sleep and food can do. I think we all woke up before the alarm, and were ready to take on the day.

First order of business was finishing the Grassy Lake Segment. It was very enjoyable as I saw multiple deer out on the trail, and it was a gentle start to the morning. The miles just seemed to fly by.

The whole morning went rather smooth, and before you know it, the Tuscobia section was done, and it was time for lunch. Woohoo.

Now the fun begins. Hemlock Creek was really enjoyable and around mile 35, I saw 2 bears on the trail. This is one of those, “You always have your GoPro, how did you not capture this?” moments. But, from 50m out, they just looked like 2 people sitting on the side of the trail. From 25m out, it was “Oh shit, 2 bears!” When the bears noticed me, they took off up the side of the hill. Fun times.

The rest of the day was pretty uneventful, smooth sailing, and finished off the Southern Blue Hills, plus some road connection miles to get to Weyerhaeuser. 60 mile day ✅

High Point: Seeing the bears! Low point: The Hotel pool was closed 🤣

Day 4: Blue Blazes

The day started out pretty fun with 17 miles of road (I like road). The trails were pretty well maintained, things seemed to be going well. I even picked up Joey, my training partner, and it seemed like the perfect mix.

We were heading out onto our last trail section of the day that *should* bring us into Cornell. However, that would be too simple. There is apparently an Old IAT and new IAT. To find the new, look for the blue blazes, and that will take you to a connecting route…

Well, a few hours later, Joey and I still were not done with the section, and we were lost in the woods. We knew we had to make a left turn at some point, but we kept making the wrong left turns 🤣 We ended up finally making it to a road (CC) but it definitely was not the road we wanted to be on that early. So, at this point, the best thing to do was go up the road to find the actual connector, then go back into the trail, and cover the distance we missed. Added some time and miles, but we got it. Woo. We finished off the day in Cornell.

High Point: Moonridge Brewery Pizza at the end of the day. Low Point: knowing we were so close to the trail, but not quite on it.

Looks like day 5 will be starting with a long road connector down 64 to Lake Eleven.

Thanks for following along.