Pooped

This was me today. Fortunately, I didn't have a lot to do except take our son to school and pick him up after his Taekwondo lesson.

The one thing that I did do was visit REI immediately after dropping my son off at school. New boots were the order of the day! This time, the sales lady was really helpful. I had brought in last month's pair of boots and she had me remove the insoles and then stand in them. Clearly, my toes were very near the end of the insole, which means that the boots were too small. I had no idea, since the boots are so stiff that it's impossible to depress the top of the toe area to find out where your toes are once inside the boot. So this was a neat trick. I went up a full size, this time trying them out with Superfeet replacing the included insole. These boots felt much better.

But would REI take the old boots back? I had a discussion with their customer service representative and was completely honest about having previously hiked in them several times. REI took the boots back, no questions asked. That was truly amazing! REI rocks! So I am now on my third pair of boots and hopefully this time, they will work!

I didn't do my incline walk today. I took a nap instead, after returning home from REI. I did have a meeting after dinner which I nearly slept through. Hoping to be recharged for tomorrow's workout at Foothill College.

Stanford Dish Walk

Today we had an incline walk on our schedule. At 5:00 pm, I picked up our son and headed for Palo Alto where I met Duane and other Team in Training participants for a walk to the Stanford Dish.

Poles and backpacks weren't really needed for this hike, which is on a paved trail. I used a fanny pack to carry a bottle of electrolyte and a bottle of water. That was really all I needed.

This was a nice medium walk up and down the rolling hills and amidst oak trees and grassy meadows. The dish itself is a radio telescope used for astronomy. I'm fairly certain that we walked by the Stanford amateur radio club as several ham radio HF antennas were also in evidence, as well as some very odd arrangements of 4 ham sticks qua dipole connected in an array. I'd love to know more about that.

"A Habit Cannot Be Tossed Out the Window; It Must Be Coaxed Up the Stairs a Step at a Time.”

-- Mark Twain (except that he was coaxing "down" the stairs).

Tonight, since we didn't have our usual workout at Foothill College, we tackled the Communications Hill staircase once again. This time we went up and down three times, some of the steps done sideways.

Old habits do die hard, however, and I take Twain's point. I'd still rather be doing anything than walking up these stairs. But I like the effect that doing this is beginning to have on my body.

Stairs, Stairs and More Stairs

Today was supposed to be our easy walk, but both of us felt like tackling the stairs again today. We only did two sets of 223 stairs, which at this point is definitely taking it easy for us!

Up, Up and Away

I spent most of the day in the car, driving a friend from the San Francisco airport to Stockton. After I got home, however, Duane and I still managed to get two sets of stairs and a small easy walk in before dinner. This was the first time that we have done the stairs at Communications Hill since we sprung forward at daylight savings time, so it was the first time we have done that walk in sunshine.

The view of the valley from the top is stunning. What a beautiful day! The weather was warm and we were down to shirt sleeves instead of rain coats and ponchos. Ahhhh!

50% and 12% of the Way

I've been dieting and exercising for about a month and a half. I'm thrilled to say that I'm halfway to my weight goal! As of this morning, I stepped on the scale and discovered that I had lost 16 pounds. That was certainly a big boost to my morale. It's nice to see progress on the scale.


Today was also our day to do our incline walk. We headed back to Communications Hill, this time with the resolve to push ourselves further than we had pushed before. We did four sets of stairs, or 892 total stairs and 600 feet elevation. Duane would calculate this as approximately 12% of the total elevation change of the Half Dome hike.


What was gratifying about this walk up and down the stairs is that both of us are much less winded than the first time we did this. It's also taking less time, as well as being easier to accomplish. All in all a good evening!


We also managed to put Duane's camera into night mode and I snapped this photo of the view from Communications Hill. Beautiful!

Back to the Future

Tonight it was back to Communications Hill - and I owe it all to Duane, who really is my best motivator.

I spent most of the day studying MySQL in an attempt to catch up on all the work I didn't do when I had bronchitis earlier this month. No walking for me, but I did get a lot of homework done.

I had dinner ready and waiting when Duane got home from work, but I had a meeting to go to at 6:45 pm. I didn't think I would have time to get my walk in, but we all finished dinner and, with half an hour before I had to go to my meeting, Duane suggested we try to get the incline walk done. Why not? We jumped into our cars and headed back to the hill, which is fortunately only a few short blocks away from home.

We had time to do the stairs twice before I had to leave to go to my meeting. 446 steps! Our son, of course, beat us both times (not surprising, but fun for him)! I'm noticing that it is getting easier to do these stairs and I'm not so out of breath when I get to the top. This evening I tried going up every other step, in an attempt to simulate the large granite steps that we will be climbing on our way to Half Dome. That's definitely kicking it up a notch and I couldn't continue for long.

We tried Duane's new tiny Canon Digital Elph camera at the top, so hopefully I'll have some new photos of the view from the staircase (when he downloads them onto his computer).

Rain or Shine

It was pouring today. The workout schedule today was our incline walk. So we waited for a break in the rain and at about 1:30 pm, we got it. We headed back to Communications Hill and its 223 steps. We managed the stairs twice before it started pouring again.

We got to the top of the hill and there, as if waiting for us, was a rainbow. Awesome!

669 Steps

That's a few more than 39. Yeah.

We went back to Communications Hill today. We did the stairs twice - 6% of the elevation change of the Half Dome hike. We looked up at the stairs and then decided to do it one more time. So we're up to 9% It gets easier every time we do it. I'm a little less out of breath each time.

The view of the city is truly beautiful. Tonight as we were descending the stairs for the last time, we had a special treat. I looked up in the sky and saw a blimp fly quietly by, lit up from below by the city lights. Every time we get to the top of the hill, I lament the fact that I don't have a camera with me. My digital SLR is far too big and bulky to bring on the hike. Duane has had his eye on a new smaller, lightweight digital camera. He ordered it tonight.

6% of the way!

Tonight, we returned to the long outdoor staircase at Communications Hill. Roger, our car's GPS, said the elevation difference between bottom and top is 150 feet, not the measly 40-50 feet shown by Google Map's topo lines. And it totals 223 steps up, and 223 steps down. We went up and down twice, for a total climb of 300 feet. That's about 6% of the elevation we'll need on the Half Dome hike. For ballast, we were carrying a full tummy of lasagna. We both felt that climbing it twice today, was easier than our single climb on Sunday. Our son did enough additional zippy back and forths and ups and downs that he was tired (for a moment) too, the first time I've seen that happen this year.

Others on our team will be building their leg muscles by doing bleacher steps at some local college stadium. Our view on Comm Hill is much better!

1% of the way?

On Saturday, we met our coaches, and others like us doing this kind of event and fundraising for the first time, and some people who have benefitted from the blood cancer research funded by the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. And got more details on what the training will entail.

One piece of bad news for me, was that we'll be meeting at 6am or so on Saturday mornings to travel to our hike locations in local hills. I'm definitely not a morning person. :(

Today I found a pedometer for $1 at an everything-for-a-dollar store. Cool! I like finding a cheap way to do things. Unfortunately, it reset its count many times during today's walk, so apparently that exhausting long steep stairway at Comm Hill was only some 17 steps. Hmmph. Christina urged me to toss it and buy a proper one whose reset button is protected. Instead, I hacked off the protruding button with my pocket knife. I think that will do it.

According to Google's topo map, that stairway only gained some 46 feet in elevation, or maybe the equiv of going up 5 floors. Or 1/100th of the elevation we'll have to do at good speed to succeed at Half Dome. We have a lot of strength and endurance training to do. Next time, I plan to count the steps (myself and with the pedo) and try out a gps unit, to calibrate that staircase more accurately.

The view from the top of the hill was awesome, with the setting sun making a fan of rays of light over the western hills.

We've Found Our Incline Hike

One of the walks we are supposed to do on our own twice a week is an incline walk. When you live on the flat and any mountains are a half hour's drive away, that makes accomplishing this task somewhat more difficult. But.... there is a rather large hill a few blocks away from our house, so this afternoon we drove over to investigate. The hill in question is Communications Hill, the central high point in the City of San Jose. It gets it's name from all of the antennas on various towers at high points on the hill. (I wonder if all of those people with expensive custom homes on the top of the hill realize that the first thing that gets destroyed in any kind of attack is the communications systems? But I digress....)

We parked at the bottom of the hill and found a quite lengthy staircase going nearly to the top. Duane tells me that the elevation is around 50-60 feet, but that seems much lower than it looked. (For those of you who went to school at the University of San Francisco, think Lone Mountain.) Our son came with us and he bounded up to the top, no problem. We followed behind, stopping only once, but by the time we reached the top, our legs were burning. The view at the top was, however, quite panoramic. We rested at the top while our son went up and down one more time. When we can do what he did, I'll know we're closer to being ready for Half Dome!

After the stairs, the incline was more modest as we approached the main antenna tower. Shortly after that, we came to a playground and, of course, had to stop while our son played for a few minutes. We then found a bicycle path that wound it's way back to the staircase, and we then descended. All in all, a good one hour incline walk. And decline. What goes up must come down!

Today was supposed to be our easy walk, but I guess we'll just switch today for tomorrow. You can see what my exercise regimen is going to be on the Workout Schedule to the right.

My diet is so far successful. I'm down eight pounds. I'm both feeling better and I'm into my "thin" jeans! I'm using The Daily Plate to track my calorie intake, my calorie expenditure (exercise), my weight and my BMI. This is a really great website. As long as you have internet access, you can track your intake anywhere. The database of food is substantial and there's rarely anything I eat, that isn't already in the database. Tracking my food like this keeps me honest.