Wednesday, April 10, 2013

Running With The Summit Seeker - Vanessa Runs

A few days ago I had the pleasure of showing some out-of-towners around Grafton Mesa. Those out-of-towners happened to be Vanessa from www.vanessaruns.com and her main man Shacky. If you haven't checked out her website, go now. We'll wait. You ought to check out serious writing skills.

They are in town for the upcoming Zion 100. (Dang Gina, this is next week!) The Grafton Mesa trail is part of the race course.

The views heading up were, as always, amazing.

Once we got to the top of the ??? foot climb we just hung out on the rim of the mesa enjoying the scenery. It pretty much doesn't get any better than this.


We took the scenic route on the way back ("scenic route" is code word for "we got lost"), as evidenced by Shacky's battle scars.

You know what is so awesome about running? Running is awesome because of the people you meet. Shacky and Vanessa are self-proclaimed hobos. They live in an RV, travel around at whim, run races when they feel like it, and always have the wind of freedom blowing through their hair. I am less spontaneous. Less free-spirited. So in my regular life I may not have crossed paths with people like Shacky and Vanessa. But running brings people like us together like old friends.

In addition to her website, Vanessa has a new book out called The Summit Seeker. I'm looking forward to reading this one. The cover picture will link you to the Amazon site if you're interested. Nine days to Zion 100!

3 comments:

  1. Too cool!

    Gotta say, I've more than once thought hobo life sounded pretty sweet. Maybe once all the kids are grown up!

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  2. You have the best adventures, so jealous. We have some of that evil white stuff here today so I got to hang out with my bike trainer - woohoo! Watch, it's going to be like 100 degrees when I'm there next week and I'm going to melt to death.

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  3. Running is such a great leveller. We're all equals out on the roads or trails - some faster, some slower, doesn't matter. There's no pretensions allowed.

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