My year didn’t exactly go as planned (whose does?), but I graded myself on how I did in 2022 anyway. Do I get an “A for effort” or an “F for hiding away and binge-watching TV”? Click to find out.
Earlier this month, I was just jogging along, a few days before my birthday, reflecting on growing up and growing older. At some point, I was struck by how long I had been running, not on this particular day but in life. Sometime this past fall I had slipped quietly past my 30th running anniversary.
The thing about time is that it slips by unnoticed. The days are long, but they run together so quickly—one week turns into a month, then an entire summer, and suddenly it’s fall. I certainly never intended to take such a long break from this blog. In fact, I carried my laptop to work for …
Running a 50k on my own forced me to confront and manage my own negative and self-defeating thoughts without that in-the-moment support from my partner that I had grown so used to, which was valuable, important, and above all, exhausting.
After a couple more active days in Soria and Burgos in May, we opted for a relaxing yet rainy day exploring the Celtiberian/Roman settlement of Tiermes.
The day after running the length of Cañon Río Lobos, we headed north to another park—Picos de Urbión. This mountainous, natural area also lies between the provinces of Soria and Burgos and part of the Iberian System—the same mountain system of Moncayo, outside of Zaragoza. The plan was to climb this region’s peak—Urbión.
When I learned there was a trail going the length of Cañon de Río Lobos, I knew I wanted to run it. Luckily I got a chance early in May.
After we explored some villages of the pre-Pyrenees by car, I decided to spend the following couple days exploring some more on foot. I had been especially eager to go into the hills on the opposite side of the main road since it is an area that would be completely new to me, and I noticed on our maps that the GR 15 runs through that area.
The first day of the Semana Santa (Easter) holidays, we explored ancient villages and new trails at the base of the Pyrenees.
What does it mean to have an unsuccessful hike? Running has objective measures of success and even the DNF or did not finish. But what about hiking? If you are doing a hike to a specific destination, I suppose not making it there could be considered a DNF, but you still went hiking, right?