Wonderland trail – Part 1 (Sunday & Monday)

I flew out to Washington on August 5^th for a run around Mount Rainier.  The 90+ mile loop on the Wonderland trail would take four days.  I’d signed up through “Adventure Running” who would be shuttling our gear from camp to camp.  Doug D and two of his nephews (Tyler and Luka) were the only others in the group of 10 that I knew.  Once we arrived in Seattle our first objective was to get in a run.  We headed to Seward park and somehow arrived during the 2-hour stretch that the park was closed!  There was a hydroplane race going on and the kick-off was a fly-over by the Blue Angels and the park was in the danger area.  We ended up getting a nice run in anyway out & back along the lake shore.  A trip to “King Donut” was only slightly marred by a local who noted that my Mountain Dew had GMOs.  I happily responded that “Yes, that is why I bought it”.

The following morning I got in a nice run on the Des Moines Creek trail which was only a mile from our hotel (the others slept in).  At the end I caught sunrise at Angle Park.  Later we met up with the others in the group and set up our camp at “Cougar Rock”.  After that we headed up to “Paradise” for a run on the Skyline & High Skyline trails.  It was a nice opportunity to loosen up prior to the real running.  We did about 7 miles with some big climbs and descents and a visit to a very scenic bathroom.  We had a nice group dinner then called it a night after preparing all of our running gear for the early morning start on the Wonderland.