I wanted to share this mainly since it gives a bit of peak into the area where I live. The Whites are about an hour north of my hometown of Concord, NH, and there are tons of trails up there (my wife used to be the botanist for the White Mountain National Forest, so she’s explored many of them!). Despite being the capital of my state, Concord is a small town and is kind of the final gateway for those heading north to popular tourist destinations (the lakes region, Whites, etc.) – it’s a wonderful place to live!

One of my goals in the future is to make an effort to hit the Whites more often, which has been a challenge since I have three small kids (my oldest was born just after we moved to NH, and we’ve had at least one kid 3 or under almost continuously since then). My youngest is just about old enough that hiking is less of a challenge, looking forward to exploring more in the future!

Last night I had the opportunity to run 10+ miles with Sherpa John and Nate.  A friend and I (thanks again Jim!) met up with them at about mile 57 of their run (about 7:15 PM), and ran/walked for about the next ten miles until a rest stop near Eastern Mountain Sports in Concord (my hometown). It was cold, dark, and snow flurries were coming down on several occasions (which was really cool!), but it was a beautiful night and a truly amazing experience to run with two people who had already put in 50+ miles on the day. The experience makes me really want to run an ultra, and more improtantly, showed me that it is possible to do something as crazy sounding as running across New Hampshire in frigidly cold temperatures. Here’s hoping they both arrive safely at the beach sometime today!

For more information about Sherpa John and his run, visit http://runnh.blogspot.com/.

Update: Sherpa John successfully completed his Run Across New Hampshire in 34 hours and 20 minutes. You can read his four-part series of blog posts on the 2009 RANH starting here: http://sherpajohn.blogspot.com/2009/10/rr-2009-ranh-part-1.html

Below are a few pictures of Sherpa John (blue jacket) and Nate (yellow shirt) taken last night:

<p>&amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;a href=”http://www.mapmyrun.com/run/united-states/nh/manchester/711125495580510581″&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;Manchester City Marathon (NH)&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;br /&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt; &amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;a href=”http://www.mapmyrun.com/find-run/united-states/nh/manchester”&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;Find more Runs in Manchester, New Hampshire&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;amp;gt;</p>

Below is the elevation map recorded by my Garmin Forerunner 205 GPS watch for the 2009 Manchester City Marathon:

A few observations about the course:

1. Most of the course is in the city of Manchester or its suburbs, so if you’re expecting an idyllic New England setting you’ll likely be disappointed. That being said, I enjoy the course, and parts of it are certainly pretty (e.g., the trail through Livingston Park, the view from the Saint Anselm Campus).

2. The uphills are tough, and there’s no getting around that fact. There are long and fairly significant uphills from about mile 1.5 to 4.5, from mile 13.5-14, and from mile 16-18.5.  There’s also an evil looking speed-bump in the final mile which I have yet to experience myself.

3. The positive tradeoff to the climbs is that what goes up must come down, and each of the hills is followed almost immediately by a significant downhill – these downhills offer a great chance to regain lost energy.  For example, there is a nice long downhill starting around mile 19 straight through mile 24 (it’s downright steep around mile 20.5 as you head down Rundlett Hill Rd. – I run this particular segment frequently). Even the smaller hills allow almost immediate reprieve once you hit the top. If you like lots of elevation change, this is the course for you.

4. The crowds are great at times, particularly in the downtown area, but I’ve heard that it can get pretty sparse in the second half. The water stop at the St. Anselm campus is staffed by the cross-country team (several of whom are or have been students of mine), and in the past they have been known to run along with struggling runners to help them along. They’re a great group, and I may be requiring their aid at about that time!

5. The weather can be pretty cold in early November. It’s probably likely to be in the 30’s-40’s at the start, and maybe warming up into the 50’s by the end (that’s about what happened last year). You just have to hope that there’s no cold rain or snow!

I’m sure there are other things I could mention, but I’ll leave that to the comments. If you happen to read this and have any questions, feel free to shoot away in the comments and I’ll see if I can answer them. Thanks for stopping by!

Our one and only camping trip in the past 5 years took place last summer, and after a smooth first night, disaster struck on day 2 when it started raining and our tent sprung several leaks. Needless to say, we packed up camp and raced home rather than roughing it through a wet night with with a 2 and 4 year old in a tent. This past winter, we were desperate to find a solution to our camping dilemma, and we decided to do the unthinkable and buy a tent/pop-up trailer (see picture at right). This weekend, we took our maiden voyage.

Our destination was Swanzey Lake Campground in SW New Hampshire, and we chose this spot due to its proximity to Mt. Monadnock, billed as the second most frequently hiked mountain in the world after Mt. Fuji. The campground was nice, and I have to admit that I love the pop-up. We were sandwiched in between tenters and seasonal RV folks, and owning a pop-up seems to have put us into some sort of weird limbo between these two groups (a position I’m not too comfortable with quite yet). The kids had a blast, and Jack the dog made himself at home on his first camping trip.

The highlight of the trip was our hike up Mt. Monadnock. It’s about two miles from the visitor’s center parking lot to the top, and we figured that we would go as far as we could until the kids got tired. Amazingly, we wound up making it well above the tree-line, and to within less than a quarter mile of the summit. My son revealed a rock climbing skill that I didn’t know he possessed, and he seemed to thrive on the steepest portions of the trail (see the little red speck on the image to the right!), and wain when the terrain flattened out. I’m proud to report that he climbed over 1500 feet up the White Dot trail without any help from me or my wife. My daughter, who is only 3, also did an amazingly good job for her age, though my wife and I took turns carrying her for a good chunk of the hike (both up and down). I was very thankful that I had just finished a marathon training cycle, as I don’t think I would have been able to handle the steep hike with a 35lb child in my arms without the punishment I had just put my body through. I’m not sure I would recommend this hike to everyone that has kids – it does get quite steep in spots, but I’m glad we did it and it provided huge confidence builder for my son. I keep trying to put myself in the shoes of a 5-year-old boy climbing what must have seemed like Mt. Everest – I’m sure he’ll never forget the experience!

My only regret from the hike is that we didn’t reach the summit. We made it to within about 10 minutes of the top (less than 1/4 mile) according to passing hikers (though they clearly didn’t understand how much longer things take with small kids!), but the last bit was steep and the kids were getting really tired. We opted not to push it, and turned back down, taking the White Cross trail on the return trip. It was easier coming down than going up, and my daughter actually wanted to walk much of the way. My son preferred to slide down the rocks on his butt, and a few other passing adult hikers tried to emulate his technique with questionable success – I think it helps to be a 5-year old with seemingly zero body fat when attempting something like this.

Anyway, we reached the bottom with burning quads and headed into Keene, NH for a well earned ice cream. I think the incentive of a banana split at the end was a major motivating factor for the kids, and I was happy to oblige given the effort put forth and surprising lack of complaining from either of them (they’re at an age where complaining/whining/fighting are standard forms of communication). I think these kids like to camp and hike, which makes mom and dad very happy, and hopefully this summer will be filled with further adventures like this!

I decided to go live with the site after some internal debate about putting out a mostly unfinished product, but realized ultimately that the best way to make the website a useful resource would be to solicit feedback from potential site visitors. I want the site content to be user driven, so I have provided a minimal site skeleton so far and will attempt to do whatever is requested/desired within the limits imposed by relevance to the site mission (i.e., primarily running in NH, though I would not immediately dismiss information from other New England states – we are pretty close to the Boston Marathon for example), my available free time, and my still amateurish and plodding web design skills. So, if you have a chance, give it a look and let me know what you think could be done to make it better.

Image via Wikipedia

So I was driving home from work today when a big pile of snow flew out from behind a parked car and landed right in front of me in the middle of the road. Once I pulled past the car, I saw that a guy was standing in his yard with a snow shovel, and he was shoveling the snow off of his lawn and throwing it into the street. Now I want spring to arrive as badly as anyone else, but shoveling one’s lawn is going a bit far if you ask me. He at least could have rolled out the snowblower to do the job a bit more quickly. It’s also not uncommon up here to see guys (it’s almost always the guys) chopping ice off of their driveways with garden shovels once it starts to get warm out (I am admittedly guilty of this myself, though I prefer to use an axe). It’s almost as if we don’t realize that a few more warm days will do the job for us with a lot less effort. I honestly think sometimes that people up here would pay for a snow-melting service to come through with a giant blow-dryer to annihilate the remaining piles of muddy snow in their yards.

So yes, spring fever seems to be pathological in NH, and it hits every year right around mid-March. I’m not even going to mention what it does to my dog.