I got to the top of Mount Flood in a good time and took my picture next to the cairn. I am pretty fast at marching up mountains these days. I’ve got a training regimen for it. Going down mountains, not so much. And then there was the muddy slugfest between Mount Flood and Mount Grande. Thankfully, my Goretex socks protected my feet from the worst. Near the base of the next mountain, I ran out of liquids. I guess I should have filled up when I had the chance. The ominous thunder and lightning was promising that I wouldn’t have to worry about the lack of water for long, but I was also only fifteen minutes away from the aid station. Hopefully they wouldn’t have run out of water yet. But there is always a chance they will, because it is hard to get more in a remote area.
Well, they did have water and I filled up, just as the rain started. And this was a rain that decided to make it personal. I had a brief moment of thinking about not putting on a jacket, because the rain was nice and cool. And putting on a jacket is not something that you want to do when you are tired, even if you are in a sheltered aid station. Thankfully I did put it on. I wish I had also put on the toque. The hail that started coming down was not pleasant. It was mostly pea sized, but every so often there was marble sized ones. And when you are only wearing a cap, your ears hurt when they are hit.
By the time I summited Mount Grande I was miserable. Rain, hail, lightning, and me carrying two metal poles. I was really hoping that someone with more sense than me would cancel the entire race; I certainly couldn’t give up, so that was the only way to get out of this. And there was no way I was stopping to take out my camera to get a picture of the next cairn. Heck, the course photographer was hiding in a truck. And I don’t think the background view was that impressive anymore. Usually, from this point, it should only take an hour to get to the end. There was no way that would happen this time.
I started the descent down the powerline cut. It was steep, muddy, and slick. I fell down a couple of times. Thankfully I wasn’t seriously hurt, although my knee still feels bruised a week later. The actual powerline itself flashed every so often; I think it was getting hit by lightning. Happy thoughts! Someone gave the good hint to try and step where the water was flowing, because that was where the mud would be washed away. It helped a bit. But the whole idea of coming down the mountain felt monumentally stupid and dangerous.
But, by the time I got to the bottom, it started to clear up. When I was in town, getting close to the end of the leg it stopped raining entirely, and blues sky was showing. But I was a mess when I got to the transition. The Goretex socks I so loved had gotten filled with water and now produced a very fine foot soup. I had a bit more than three hours to get to the next transition before I would be cutoff. And the last time I did leg three, it took me three hours. Since it looked like it would be clear for awhile, I gave my mother my jacket so that it could hopefully get dried off. I ate and drank and took some Tylenol and then off I went.