It's a Nice Place to Walk to, But I Wouldn't Want to Live There!

It's been a while since I did one of my long lunch time walks in the city. But yesterday, I got to work early and stayed late, and decided to take a long walk at lunch on a gorgeous - although very warm - spring day. Last spring, I'd gone south - around the flood wall - and I'd gone east - up Libby Hill and past St. John's Church - so yesterday, it was time to head west. So west I went, to Hollywood Cemetery, which is also a popular spot each year for a Team in Training run. This area is big enough that I need to go back soon and show the rest of it.

With my switch to race for a cure for breast cancer this year - a 60 mile walk in September - I will be doing a ton of walking. I also need to slow my pace a bit from my normal 12.5 to 14 minutes per mile to a more leisurely 15-16 minutes per mile, so walks like yesterday's are a good way to try this out and get used to a slower pace. If I don't do this, trying to do 20 miles a day for three straight days at the faster pace will make my legs "dead" by the third day, I think. I took lots of pictures on my 4.75 mile walk, and here they are:

I started out heading down towards the James River. Here is a view looking back along Brown's Island and the Haxall Canal:

From there, it was a short walk past historic Tredegar Iron Works and the city's Civil War Center:

Then I headed under the Robert E. Lee Bridge and north on the Northside Trail, part of a longer hike last fall:

I knew, from last fall, that the Northside Trail went right past the cemetery, and I was right. But to my dismay, there was a tall fence. A narrow tree lay from the path to the fence, with about an 8-10 foot drop. I was tempted to try, but it seemed like a good way to break an ankle. After poking around for a few minutes, I found the "back door" to Hollywood Cemetery:

Here is a view of hikers heading north on the Northside Trail below me:

This beautiful structure in the cemetary almost looks like a chapel with the stained glass windows and the open view of the James River:

A locomotive hauling minerals from the mountains down to the sea passes along the track, with the Hollywood Rapids and Belle Isle in the distance:

The gravesite of Fitzhugh Lee, son of Robert E. Lee, along with family members, is adorned with a pink and a white dogwood:

The gravesite of Jefferson Davis, President of the Confererate States of America:

The mausoleum of Lewis Ginter, who gave the original money to found the spectacular Ginter Botanical Gardens:

A guardian angel watches over this tomb:

An elaborate stone tree grows skyward from this grave site:

The grave of John Tyler, President of the United States, of "Tippecanoe and Tyler, Too" fame:

The grave of James Monroe, President of the United States:

The dogwood is the state flower of Virginia, and is glorious in the spring:

During the typhus epidemic of 1862, three young children of Confederate General James Longstreet and his wife Louise perished, and lie here in eternal rest:

As much as I wanted to keep walking, I had a meeting back at work and headed out of the Cemetary, passing through the neighborhood of Oregon Hill:

A Future Long Walk in the Pink

I'm going to make a crossover today between this and my other blog, Racing for a Cure. In late September, I'll be walking 60 miles in three days near Washington DC as part of the Susan G. Komen 3-Day for the Cure, to defeat breast cancer. Along the way, I hope to raise a minimum of $3,600 for this cause.

In addition to raising money for the Komen organization, I do this walk to honor my sister, Ann, who has been battling breast cancer for over four years. She has fought with amazing bravery, but the cancer has spread to her liver, bones, and lungs. I'll be walking 60 miles, a long way to go, and difficult enough. But it is not as difficult or exhausting as it would be for my beloved sister to walk 100 feet. I can't save her, but I CAN walk 60 miles to hopefully inspire people to donate money that will save the lives of others.

If you want more information about what I am doing, or would consider making a donation, you can go to my 3-Day fundraising page here. Perhaps there is a loved one of yours who has battled cancer that you would like to honor with a donation. If so, I will write his or her name on the shirt that I will wear the third and final day of the walk on September 25.

Why should you care about a cure for all breast cancers? Well, if you a woman, I don't think I need to ask you that. But what about men? Should men care? Well, a man is writing this! Besides that, do you have a mother, wife, daughter, grandmother, girlfriend, sister, female cousin, aunt, granddaughter, sister-in-law, female friend, etc? Do I make my point? If not, believe it or not, men get breast cancer, too - it is just fairly rare.

Thanks for your consideration of supporting my long walk in the pink!

Rambling Around Richmond

Althought not exactly a hike, I put about 12 miles on my feet yesterday in Richmond. It was a great test of my post-surgical foot, and 6.2 miles of it was for the Monument Avenue 10K. With 41,000 runners and walkers, that is one of the largest foot races in the United States. Of course, for most participants, we are just racing against ourselves, out there to enjoy the experience. Richmond is a pretty place in the spring, the race is a great spectator event, and I put lots of photos and the story of the day here on my other blog. If you read far enough down in that post, you will learn the tale of the courage and determination that I witnessed yesterday, and which will always be with me!

Our National Symbol

I have a 10K race coming up in two days, and have had all kinds of problems training for it – the latest being another bad cold, a couple of migraines, and a very sore knee. So I did not run this past weekend, but I did try a hard workout on the elliptical machine to see how my knee felt. The answer was – no worse. So Monday and Tuesday being nice days - before an accurately forecasted rainy period - I decided to walk at lunch so I could at least get a little exercise that would help me with my upcoming race.

I managed to get in about 3.25 miles Monday and 3.75 miles Tuesday, both on walks to Belle Isle, the site of a terrible Civil War prison camp 150 years ago, but now a tranquil and pretty place in the middle of a big city. During both hikes, I spotted a mature bald eagle in a tree up river, and on Monday’s trek, there were two large ospreys in a tree down river. Just a half mile or so down river is the site of a large great blue heron rookery.

There is something really cool about being in a large city and seeing a bald eagle - that something so wild and so symbolic of both our country and of wilderness can live so near to so many people. As much as I enjoyed my walks, I enjoyed even more thinking about this bird, and what it represents.

North Anna River Battlefield

Sometimes things don't work out as we plan, and yesterday was a good example. I decided to take a March Madness break for a few hours and go for a hike, my first in boots since the foot surgery 8 weeks ago. I chose the Cumberland Marsh Natural Area, a place that I had never been. It has what sounds like a nice 4.5 mile hike with the possibility of seeing marsh birds and other wildlife. So off I went!

As I reached the tiny, and empty, parking lot 50 minutes later, I pondered why no one else would be here on such a nice spring day. I got out of my car and approached the informational board, on which was posted a large sign saying that the area was closed because of unstable dams. Damn indeed! My car gets about 52 mpg on a trip like this, but even so, I had just wasted nearly a gallon of gasoline! I turned around and headed back, deciding for a shorter hike at the North Anna River Battlefield Park instead. It would be about 15 miles out of the way to the north on the way back.

The North Anna River site marks a vicious battle fought near 150 years ago on May 23-26, 1864 as Grant kept trying to get around Lee's army on the way to Richmond. It happened shortly after the much bloodier battle at Spottsylvania Courthouse and just before the huge and very bloody battle at Cold Harbor. Because of a strong Confederate defensive position, the river, and Union mistakes - including an ill-advised attack by a stone-cold drunk general - the US Army became divided into three parts. Lee was ill, and his generals could not execute his battle plan without him. Thus, his battered army could not take advantage of a golden opportunity. Otherwise, this could have been a very bloody battle, and a large part of Grant's army might have been destroyed or captured. I would guess that for the 5,000 men who were killed, wounded, or captured, it was plenty bloody and miserable enough.

It never fails to strike me how peaceful these battlefields are today, in sharp contrast to the violence, pain, and misery that once occurred on these bucolic grounds. The photograph of the poem at the end of this post sums up that sentiment very well.

The 2.5 miles of out and back walking are mostly level and easy. What are woods today would have been mostly open country at the time of the Civil War:

The Confederate Army dug extensive defensive trenches here. Nearly 150 years later, many of them are still in evidence. They built a strong defensive position with the North Anna River on one side and a trench line like an inverted "V" - such as the point of a spear.

Even though the trail was flat, the surrounding terrain is often steep. Here, you can get a hint of the North Anna River right at the end of the defensive works and several hundred feet below. It must have been hellish to have to fight a battle on these grounds.

At the entrance to the park is a memorial plaque with a very apt poem of reconcilliation it. We are one country now, not many.

Bay Walk, Beach Walk, Brisk Walk

Today, I took the longest continuous walk since my foot surgery just over a month ago. I walked 4.5 miles in Back Bay National Wildlife Refuge, most of it on the beach, although the first mile of the hike was along the bay and marsh.

I slept poorly last night and was awake by 5:30. I could easily have made this another dawn beach walk, but instead, I got up for good about 6:10, and relaxed with a mug of hot tea while listening to a Mozart piano concerto (#12, so lyrical and serene!), and read about great hikes in my latest Backpacker Magazine. Around 7AM, I drove to the refuge and started walking about 30 minutes after sunrise. The tide was ebbing, as shown by this screen shot from my GPS:

Here is my route, mapped onto my DeLorme Topo USA software from my GPS. I hiked south through the marsh, cut through the dunes to the beach, hike south on the beach about a mile and a half, and then reversed course to eventually cut back through the dunes north of my original beach access point:

There is something so tranquil about a early morning walk on the beach. It gave me some time to reflect on things in my life, think about the recent passing of my friend, Judy, and think about my sister and her illness. Along the way, I tried to be at peace with how things are right now. The wind was brisk and raw at times, but it felt good to be out walking and communing with nature. Here are some photos from my walk.

Cattails along the marsh:

Tundra swans, heading north towards the Yukon:

And resting in the marsh:

Boardwalk access to the beach protects the dunes:

This driftwood appears to guard the beach:

The ocean is so tranquil this time of day:

It is like this all the way to the North Carolina border about 9 miles down the beach:

Pelicans are such a cool bird:

This claw is all that remains of a blue crab, which survived against inconceivable odds to become an adult. Probably, some of his molecules live on in the muscle tissue of a gull:

This gull has managed to find breakfast:

Dunes protect the marsh. The dune zone here is about a quarter mile wide:

Swans fly in "V" formation over the ocean, heading north:

Stomping Breast Cancer With Hiking Boots

My friend Chris, AKA “Hawkeye,” steps off in about a month to head north on the Appalachian Trail. He plans on hiking about half of it, ending at Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, or just over 1,000 miles. And he has decided to make the hike about something bigger than just a long walk in the woods. He is going to raise money for the Susan G. Komen For a Cure organization. Chris’s wife is a recent breast cancer survivor.

Breast cancer is a horrible disease. I was thinking today of all the people I personally know who have had to face it. My sister, Ann, who is fighting stage 4 right now. My sister-in-law Christine, who is a 22 year survivor. My friends Janice, Mary Beth, and Bev. My former co-workers Lisa and Linda (who died from it several years ago).

I hope someday we can stomp this disease into the ground, and all other cancers. That is why I race for a cure, and it is one reason Chris is doing this long hike. If you are interested in following Hawkeye’s preparation and progress, you can do so here.

And if you would like to donate to the fine Komen organization in support of Chris’s hike, you can do so here. Even a penny a mile, just a $10 donation, will add up in this desperate fight to kick breast cancer – with hiking boots, in this case - to the curb!

The Last Sunset

I saw an amazing sunset at the end of my New Year’s Eve hike in the Back Bay Wildlife Refuge. The next day, I learned of a poetry form new to me, the monotetra. It has the following rules:

Each stanza has four lines.
Each line has exactly eight syllables.
The end of the first line in a stanza rhymes with the end of the other three lines in that stanza.
The final line of each stanza repeats the same four syllables.

So, inspired by the beautiful sunset that evening, I thought I would try writing a monotetra about it a day or two later, and here is my effort. I decided tonight to finally put this out on my blog.

"The Last Sunset"

I stand and watch the setting sun
On New Year’s Eve; day’s course has run.
Feels like this year had just begun,
Yet now it’s done. Yet now it’s done!

Vivid hues paint darkening skies;
Swans fill the air with their wild cries;
One beats its wings and starts to rise.
How high it flies! How high it flies!

The sky, in hues of orange and rose,
Tints faint with blush last weekend’s snows
Mother Nature so proudly shows
Her new year’s clothes - her New Year’s clothes.

Across the marsh, last light subsides;
‘Neath cloak of darkness, the sun hides;
Towards history, the old year glides;
New Year presides! New Year presides!

I know one day my sun will set
Although that’s easy to forget.
When that day comes, will I regret
Things not done yet; things not done yet?

Art Ritter
January 2, 2011

Lunch Time Walk to Great Blue Heron Colony

2011 has not gotten off to a great start for hiking, or too much else, actually. First, there was the death of our dear friend, Judy, at the start of the year - just four weeks after being diagnosed with multiple myeloma. Two days after her memorial service, I headed to upstate New York to visit my sister Ann, ill with stage four breast cancer. Five days after I got back home, I had foot surgery, which has pretty much sidelined me for three weeks.

I took the bandage off yesterday for good, and decided I needed a little lunch time hike today. I went to the great blue heron colony in the James River, right in downtown Richmond. This is an interesting urban hike, as documented in more detail in my blog here almost a year ago. My walk today was 2.25 miles, and I had no trouble at all, despite my foot surgery of 3 weeks ago. It felt great to take a walk on a nice day and enjoy some views of the river and wildlife. My route, as tracked by my DeLorme PN-60 GPS, is shown on the map below. I walked in a clockwise direction, and the three little images show where I took my pictures.

Here are some herons on their nests, high in the trees on an island in the river:

A view of the island from where I stood, with many nests in sight:

Nice painting on a bridge support, with a formal sign on the other side of the support:

Rapids further upriver:
View of Tredegar Iron Works Civil War Visitor Center:

A Short Walk

I am still limping but can almost walk normally now, as long as my foot is wrapped and stuffed in an open shoe, like my Croc. I can maybe walk at a 20 minutes per mile pace, which is slow for me, but at least people are not passing me as much along the street as I go to and from the car at work.

Yesterday was a nice day, and I am sick of being a coach potato and sedentary person. So I decided to trade a little foot pain for some exercise and fresh air. It was not exactly a hike, but I walked up to the State Capital Grounds and made a loop around the Capital. Virginia has a really beautiful Capital, designed by none other than Thomas Jefferson.

I stopped at one of the best monuments I have ever seen, the one dedicated a couple of years ago to the Civil Rights movement, right on the grounds of the Capital of the Old Confederacy. It is a beautiful and moving monument, and I am always inspired when I see it. It is the only monument on the grounds that depicts a woman, a minority, and a child. I paused for a few minutes and reflected on that part of our country’s history.

I continued down the brick walkways and back to the street. I decided to go pay respects to our former State Supreme Court Chief Justice, Leroy Hassell, who’s body was lying in state in the capital building. He died from lymphoma a few days ago at only age 55. I don’t know him, of course, but as a cancer survivor, I feel a connection. He was the state’s first black Supreme Court justice, and also the first black chief justice. So I walked up through the Capital Building to the rotunda, where his flag-draped coffin stood next to the remarkable Houdon statue of George Washington.

From there, I retraced my steps to go back outside, and thence back to work. It felt good to move around a bit. I can’t wait to be able to walk normally again, then ultimately try a real hike and some running! But that is all still some weeks away.