The Epic Adventure Begins - Update

I just got home from dropping Eric and Rob off at Tiger Mountain. We took a side trip to one of the low points of the trek, where the guys ran up the trail and stashed food and water, then we met up with Arthur just below the access to the trail head. Arthur and his dog got in our car and I drove them the half mile up the road, then watched as they disappeared into the woods. I'll see them again about 20 hours from now, at Rob's house. I'm going up there tomorrow to stay with his four kids while his wife gets off to work. I couldn't see Rob missing his chance at an epic adventure because of a few hours of overlap between the run and her work, so I offered to watch the kids. It should be fun!

It was a long, dark and rainy drive home from Tiger - just about an hour exactly. We've had on again/off again rain for the last few days - that is, till today when it rained steadily all day. It was sprinkling when I dropped the guys off and the forecast is for rain through the night and into tomorrow. It certainly adds an element to the adventure - wet foliage, muddy trails and drippy skies.

I got to visit my friend today - one of the women in the accident two weeks ago. She was transferred back to our hometown hospital this week, and amazingly, was going home today. She is doing much better than expected - she has a halo device on to stabilize her head, she has had back surgery and a rod inserted into her arm and has some kind of traction device hooked up to her hand, plus bruises and cuts, but she is walking around, sitting in regular chairs, and best of all, ready to go home. Our other friend will be here in about three weeks - they will be transferred here for rehabilitation for her head injuries. She is now able to travel, so the services for her girls are being held in Montana tomorrow . Everyone is holding up pretty well - the love and support surrounding them is a huge piece of their recovery. I'll be thinking of them all tomorrow.

I've made an effort to get back to my typical running schedule this week. It's been six weeks since my last marathon - my leg is mostly healed and I'm ready to start the mileage build up. I'm trying to do it sorta slow - I think we did four on the beach on Sunday, I ran six with Rick Tuesday, six with Jenny and Emily Wednesday, five with Barb Thursday morning and four with Wendy, Jenny and Mark on Thursday night for a total of 25 miles. I plan to run five tomorrow morning bringing me to 30 for the week. Next week I'm going to bump one of those weekday runs up to eight miles, then the week after start bumping up one of the weekend runs.

Signing off from the rainy side of the state, where the skies are dark, the trails are muddy and the men are running through the night.

Update: They are home safe and sound. I heard from them several times starting at 7:15 this morning, and through the day. It was tough and took a little longer than expected. I imagine they'll get posts up in the next day or two.