The Great Solar Eclipse of 2017 crossed the continent, from Oregon to South Carolina, and gave millions of people the chance to witness one of the most awe-inspiring events in the natural world.

But you had to be within the "path of totality", a narrow band across the earth's surface several thousand miles long but only about 70 miles wide. Outside that band you would only see a partial eclipse, not a total eclipse.

And there is no such thing as a "partial total eclipse", despite the impression blogs and the news media might give. I honestly think that's why so many people misunderstand the utter beauty of the spectacle; they may have seen a partial eclipse in the past that was total somewhere else, and even though they weren't in the path the news kept gushing about it being a total eclipse, so they assume they must have seen a total eclipse and just didn't find it all that impressive.


Posted by Dan 08/29/2017, revised 09/06/2017

A full Ironman. It's not a thing you do by accident. And yet there I was about 120 miles in, saying aloud, "I don't even know what I'm doing out here!" which I suppose could have been interpreted a number of different ways by the other runners within earshot.

It all started a few weeks ago, as I was swimming laps on a lovely Boulder afternoon, when an idea popped into my head. Sometimes I do my best thinking while swimming.

Since relocating, I had set my sights on the IM Boulder 70.3 as a good choice for the season's "A" race. It's in August, and it's practically down the street from where I live, so the logistics would be super simple, leaving me to focus solely on the work of racing hard.

So I was swimming, and thinking about August, and about training, and I suddenly realized -- hey, there's a full Boulder Ironman some time in June. Maybe I should use it as a big workout day. What a perfect way to prep for the 70.3! Get in a solid open water swim at the same venue. Seize the opportunity for a supported long ride, where fresh water bottles magically appear in my hand at regular intervals. And then I could just skip that stupid marathon, because who wants to do all that extra running anyway? Not me!

I was a little nervous about bringing up the idea of entering the Ironman to my coach, because we have a focused plan we're working on for the summer, and the long post IM recovery is not part of that. But he was thrilled. He said it would be a great day of quality training on the bike, and we planned to even include a few miles of run before I surrendered my timing chip and headed to brunch. Because a little brick run is the cherry on top of every great cycling workout.

I kept the plan on the down-low because I didn't want people to be disappointed when they found out I didn't finish. And I had to constantly remind myself -- it's not a race, it's a training day!

Ironman makes that hard, though, with all their pomp and fanfare.

For a training day that was supposed to be light on logistics, this ended up being a lot of running around. I managed to make three individual trips to the Ironman Expo downtown, plus the trip out to the reservoir to drop off my bike. Pros were granted the privilege of driving in with their bikes on race morning, and I assumed I'd just bike the two miles over to the reservoir, but we were told NO bike commuting to the race site (because it was too dark). Since Brad and I are a car-free household, this presented a problem, both for getting my bike to the reservoir on Saturday, and for getting myself to the race site the next day. Athletes were told to take shuttles out to the race, but I was pretty sure I could walk to the reservoir in the time it would take me to get downtown, wait in the shuttle line, and sit smooshed in that school bus for the six mile ride out to the race start.

This training day was turning into a bit of a headache!

The night before the race -- er, training day, I looked up the final version of the pro roster and saw that there were only ten women on the list, including me ... and prize money for this race goes ten deep.

Basically all I had to do was finish before midnight, and I'd go home with a paycheck. But finishing was not in the plan.


Posted by Kimberly 06/16/2017

Yup, I'm taking over my page now! Since 2003 i haven't done anything except a trip on my bike last summer. Well, I guess that about brings us up to date. Moving on.

My summer was spent in the wonderful little village of San Luis Obispo, nestled against the California coastal range, where i participated in an internship at the 'we're too good for Nik' Cal Poly University. Let me just say, SLO rocks! As do all the wonderful people i met there this summer, and I can't wait to return next year.

We'll cut into this little reminiscion with a recount of my last mini-backpacking trip near Sequoia National Park, so i can put in some cool pictures.

A friend from the internship and I headed out after work on friday for a weekend backpacking trip in the Sierra's. We got in late and stayed at a little walk in camp that was tucked waaay up a small winding backroad near the trailhead. This was also the only bear sighting on our trip. We awoke early to find a black bear not more than 50 yards off in the camp area. He wasn't interested in our food though, just beating up the trees around there.

Backpacking in the High Sierras

Posted by nik 08/22/2008, revised 08/22/2008

If you're reading these entries chronologically, this one is directly linked from the Folk Festival: I arrived back in Townsville Monday morning only to turn right around again and head out for a 3-day camping trip with the ultimate frisbee crowd. And what a fun, fantastic crowd they are!

Monday morning, a group of 11 of us left for Keel Bottom Creek, about 45 minutes northwest of Townsville. We found a great place to set up camp along the creek, complete with a fan-mazing rope swing!! Most of our time was spent on this rope swing - it was perfect. We enjoyed 3 days of just relaxing in the PERfect sunny weather, playing in the creek, lying in the hammock, listening to music and running one of the car batteries dead, sitting by the campfire, and cooking up fantastic campfire-food (i had kangaroo for the first time! roo stew... SO tasty!).

A lot of the people that play ultimate frisbee are study-abroad students, so a number of them are leaving after exams these next 2 weeks. The camping trip was sort of an end-of-term, goodbye celebration for those of us that won't be around anymore, and it was a perfect way to conclude a great semester of fun and friends. We all had the time of our lives, and every moment of the trip was enjoyed to the fullest.

Our group of friends, hanging out on the rope swing tree ...Mom, I know you're squinting your eyes, thinking, "Which one's my daughter?" I'm the one at the very top.

Here again, I don't have my own pictures from the trip, but I've linked one of the other people's photo albums so you can get a look at this amazing trip. But yet again, not many captions, so you'll just have to look and enjoy.

Photo album - Ultimate camping: https://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2495651&l=fe685&id=13930813

Posted by Whitney 06/15/2008, revised 06/15/2008