Brief observations

from tonight's run, finished at dark:

The only time Cedar Hill, on the northwest shore, appears as the island it once was, in the ice age, is when the sun has at last fallen behind Conway Summit, and the rest of basin has waded carefully into shadow. Then, looking the miles to its lit slope, I imagine myself 700 feet underwater.

The ants on the road up to Black Point--a feature which was also underwater, and erupted there, super-heating the lake--have cleared each granule of black sand, each rounded shard of basalt, around their own small, waiting craters.

There's a certain distance, running away from Wilson Creek, where the water sounds as a car, and instinctually I turn, startled. Afraid. How far we, I, have come from our original confidence in and closeness to streams.

Nighthawks were born to spook runners, and each other, with their shouting feathers.


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12 mi, 84 min; Mono City to the Wilson Creek/Cemetery Road junction, and out and back, spidery offshoots from there toward Black Point and County Park

First long-ish run

Fourteen miles today, my longest run since the late spring of 2009. Waited until the afternoon cooled, then did the usual Conway Ranch Loop, but added on a couple more miles out and back on a relatively level dirt road--I think it's called Goat Ranch Cut-off--that runs north of and roughly parallel to 167. (I'll make a map soon to delineate these various obscure routes.)

Near my turn around, I slipped past a cluster of rusty cars and trailers in an expected, disorganized junk circle (like they'd come to a watering hole altogether to drink). And there was a man, sitting outside, focused on something in his lap. He didn't notice me as I went by with the wind; the road was soft with shallow sand. I wondered if all those metal animals belonged to him, or if he'd simply joined their lot for the night. Or the summer? If longer, I suppose they arrived, gathered around him one at a time, like the sheep and Basque herders that ran not long ago in nearby hills.

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14 mi, 98 min; Conway Ranch Loop, with an extension down Goat Ranch Cut-off

Week in review: 65 mi/6 days + 1 rigorous hike