Northern Rail Trail

November 19, 2011

The weather is once again playing with us here in New Hampshire.  Forecast for Saturday was low 50’s, sunshine and of course wind.  This comes after a couple really chilly days that made me remember what November is supposed to feel like.
I decided to head out and explore the new section of the Northern Rail Trail.  They added another 2 miles this past September/October.  You can now get on at Webster Place a few miles out of downtown Franklin.  It’s looking really good too.

The newest sections are still a tad soft, but it does cover up the 3-4″ gravel that was there before.  This section should be good and bedded in by next Spring.

The above shot is what the rail bed looks like before the NRT folks work their magic.  It’s a major snowmobile corridor in the winter, but the rest of the year it is virtually impossible to ride except maybe your mtn bike, and trust me it’s not fun, I’ve done it a few times.

They have also repainted all the mile markers up to the Vermont border.  When I was riding up to Hanover this past summer, it was a little mind numbing at times to see each mile counted down.  It does let you get a good idea of how far you have gone though.  On the opposite side is the mileage to Boston, MA.

It was a good little ride after a week of very little exercise.  Being on the rail trail got me out of traffic and the wind for awhile.  I only rode up to the Webster Lake section, then turned around and headed home so I could make it to a party for a long time friend of mine who is headed to Afghanistan this coming Friday.  I wish him the best of luck and can’t wait to see him in 6 months safe and sound.

Hallo-Weiner Hustle

November 20, 2011

Paul, Freestyle, Cyndi and Shannon all did the rescheduled Hallo-Weiner Hustle.  It was supposed to be on October 30th, but the 18+ inches of snow cancelled it that day and it was finally rescheduled for today.
The basic gist of this race goes like this…. 4 person relay, before the next runner can start, the previous runner must:
1. Run their 1.25 miles
2. Drink 23 oz of beer
3. Eat a hot dog
Costumes were encouraged since it was supposed to be a Halloween event.
Needless to say this could prove to be highly entertaining.  I don’t drink and I don’t eat beef products, so I opted out (turns out they had non-alcoholic beer and tofu dogs as options) of running, but I promised to take pictures.

I’ll let most of the images do the talking.  As you can imagine, it is pretty tough to get down a beer and hot dog after just running 1.25 miles as hard as you could manage.
Teams had to keep in mind that there was a 1 minute penalty for each person who “tossed their cookies” if you know what I mean.

This was the 1st annual.  Let’s hope they do it again next year.

Thanks for reading.

-Pete