6:39 a.m., January 11, 2007.  At present our temperature is 25 degrees F with a North Wind blowing at 25 mph bringing the wind chill down to -1 degree F.  For San Juan Island, or any where else in this world, that is just plain cold.  Yesterday we received close to 6 inches of snow.  See picture to the right.

Last night I went for my schedule run, yes, in the snow.  I not really a snow running stranger.  During the winter of 1992-1993, while training for the Boston Marathon, I lived in Helena, Montana and ran in more snow and cold temperatures than a normal human being should have to run in.  I remember one Saturday run the temperature was -9 degrees F and the snow was up over my knees.  Due to the fact that I wanted to run well at Boston, I was very dedicated to my training - so running in cold temperatures was what I needed to do.  Every time my training partners would say "It can't get worse", it would.

My San Juan Island Snow Run was really pretty nice.  I left the house around 6:00 p.m. and headed out Turn Point Road and ran for 30 minutes and then turned around and headed back to town.  The road had a layer of about an inch of fresh snow, eliminating slipperiness.  The wind was blowing and the snow was falling so hard that I couldn't use my headlamp due to the light reflecting back off of the snow.  It turned out that I didn't need the headlamp from the lights reflecting off of the clouds.  I didn't have any problems seeing the road.  My only concern was when a large branch broke off a tree and fell to the ground a few seconds after I had run past.  Hearing that "crack" was unsettling.

I have to admit, I do like running in new snow, or freshly fallen snow.  The stillness, the quite and the sense of something different is refreshing.  I did forget how much harder running in snow is.  One uses different muscles running in snow and those muscles of mine are reminding me that they like to not be used.