I love riding my bike. We don’t do enough riding. This evening was a perfect summer evening. That sent of summer was in the air, that gentle air that is so light. Perfect for a ride.
Posts Tagged With: Best Friends
Summer Evening Ride
Morning run
So nice that the late spring weather has been perfect this year. Here are a few shots from our morning run. 😊
Volunteering Sunday
We popped into town today to volunteer at the Easter Seals Run this morning. The Upper Canada Mall Easter Seals 10k is York Region’s longest running fundraiser for children and youth with physical disabilities. Over the past 40 years this race has raised nearly $3 million to help children and youth with physical disabilities.
Team Running Free Newmarket and the Blister Sisters were course marshals, making sure all the runners and walkers were on the right track. It was great to see such a good turn out on such a hot morning for a great cause!
Raid the Rib 2016
Interesting weather for April last Sunday. It was cold, below freezing, damp and even a little snowy at times. Not quite want we expected for a mid-April romp through the woods. It was just perfect weather for Raid the Rib at Albion Hills Conservation Area. From what we could tell the organizers from Don’t Get Lost had a great turn out for the race.
Our team had a newbie this year, we were fortunate that Stephanie was able to join our team to make up the required team of three – The Blister Sisters and the Band-Aid (although she would have preferred to be called the butterfly strip!) We arrived in plenty of time to plan our route and to fill Stephanie in how an orienteering race works. She was a great addition to our team.
Studying the maps, we picked out the controls that we thought we could get to with in the 4 hour time limit. We did caution Stephanie that this was just an idea we had, we don’t ever really stick to our plan. When alternatives pop up, chances are we’ll take them, so be prepared for anything!
The first three or four controls were a piece of cake. Partly because of our great map reading skills and partly because the snow cover ground presented a trail right to the control. Track reading goes along with map reading, right?
Off we went down the road and onto the second map. Now, I’ve mountain biked at Albion, it’s a pretty popular place for riding and I have a general idea of there I am when I’m there. I really had no reference for the second map. We had to trust our map reading abilities, which at first proved to be sketchy and we got completely turned around after a couple of controls. No problem, here is where the alternative popped up. We just continued mapping our controls we hadn’t planned on getting but did find just like that. Everything just fell into place!
Other than that little turn around and missing one control we were sure we were going to find, we had a great race. Stephanie survived and we made it back to the finish with minutes to spare!
It’s Maple Syrup Time
Winter is passing and cold nights and bright sunny days can only mean it’s Maple Syrup time! On our run this morning we came across trees tapped along the back road.
There are a number of types of maples that can be tapped and apparently these old beautiful trees are just right.
I had the opportunity to help make maple syrup with a dear friend who tapped the trees on her beautiful property. I always thought it would be a big involved production to make syrup but it wasn’t. She just boiled it down on her barbeque. It was just as simple as the syrup is. Pure Canadian sweetness.
I checked out the web to find out more about maple syrup’s history and production. If you have a minute check it out here. Maple Syrup
Winter run
It’s been a rare day this winter when we have had an opportunity to run with snow on the ground. It’s been such a mild winter so far. Who know what the rest of February and March have in store. What ever happens we will remember that today was a beautiful day for a morning run.
#runtheyear
Usually we lay low during December and into January but then this little motivational gem came along. Run 2016 miles in 2016. http://www.runtheyear.com . We’re in! That’s 3244.44 kilometres in 2016!
We’ve made our first milestone so to speak, we clicked off 200 miles in January, that’s 321 kilometres! The Blister Sisters are off and running!
January Robins
A frosty morning run in January and what did we see? A tree full of robins! It’s been an easy winter, but we still can’t wait for spring!
Raid the Hammer 2015
The Blister Sister and the Bandage met up again to run Raid the Hammer put on by Don’t Get Lost. We had a great run on a beautiful November Sunday!
The race took place in the Dundas area, just outside of Hamilton. I actually recognized where we would be running from the maps handed out, we ran in the same area a few years ago. Luck for us this area was also our team member Jean’s (the bandage) old stomping ground so we had the advantage of knowing which way was up on the map!
We did really well, we weren’t last, we found all the controls and we defiantly had more than a few laughs. Isn’t that what running with friends is all about!
I’ve posted a few of our photos here and there are more great photos on the Don’t Get Lost Facebook page.
Where did June go! Our June Update!
Just a little post to update everyone on what we were up to last month.
June was a training month for us, lots of running and stretching. As June is bug month around here and it was pretty rainy, we were on the road a lot, not too much trail time just so we didn’t get eaten alive by the mosquitoes lurking there.
We did get involved with the Relay for Life. The Relay for Life is a fund raiser that the Canadian Cancer Society holds to raise money for cancer research and to help fund their outreach programs. We don’t usually fund raise but for this event we did manage to pull it together and raise a few dollars. We decided that everyone who donated to our Blister Sister team would get a thank you gift from us so we knitted up socks, finger less gloves and running hats to give the all great people who donated to our team. The event was held in the evening at a local private school’s track. We walked 17k in the 6.5 hours we spent walking around the track into the early morning. It was particularly inspiring when they lit all the luminaries remembering folks who had passed and those who were survivors. It reminded us that we were doing this not for the ones who had passed but for the people who weren’t even diagnosed yet.
The very next day we were out having a great time volunteering at ESAR – Emergency Services Adventure Race by Storm Events. The race was held this year at Hardwood Hill Ski and Bike Park, the same park that will host the mountain bike portion of the Pan Am games this month. ESAR is comprised of team made of Police, Fire, EMS, Military and Civilian teams.
Of course we weren’t actually at this venue, we were some there “out there” at CP2 and 4 checking riders and runners in an out of the check points. Checking in and out of a check point helps the organizers keep track of all the teams. If someone checks in and doesn’t check out, we can only assume they are lost or injured and they need help. Try telling an EMS guy or a cop if they don’t check back in I’m call a search party of their co-workers to go look for them. They soon caught on about the checking in and out of a manned check point. We had great time with everyone. We love volunteering at adventure races.
This weekend we are volunteering at the Rebecca Run. For the last 14 years the Blister Sisters have been there to help out any way we can. It really is the best little 5k around, family friendly and very inspiring. Check it out.
My next volunteering roll with be with the Pan Am Games #Toronto2015. I’m tasked with being a floor manager with the Sports Presentation team at Hardwood Mountain Bike Park. I’ll let you know how that goes.
Among all this volunteering we are training. Our next event is the Rock Star Adventure Race. This is our all-time favorite event. There is something about being in the bush with no idea where you are and being able to find your way out that appeals to us (and knowing if we really do get lost someone will come and find us!) With our new found skills with a compass this should be a lot of fun. A race report to come!













