Another First - Hiking!

I had an absolutely fabulous day today!

The weather was finally nice & warm, so Nate and I hit the trails this morning.

I was pretty nervous.  This was my first real attempt at hiking since my injury.  During the spring and summer months, hiking was the way I loved spending my weekends and my favorite way to exercise. I didn't really get to do any hiking at all last year, and the last real hike I did was King's Peak in the summer of 2014.  Then I broke my foot and everything changed.

The hike I chose was a fairly easy one.  It's a hike I've done about a dozen times and one that can be done earlier in the season with little snow, and it's one of my favorites.  There are technically 5 points you can hike to on this 9 mile hike, but I chose to hit only the first one that is about a 2 mile round trip.  It isn't that steep, but still a really good workout!  The goal wasn't to hit any PR's, or do it as fast as I could, or anything like that.  I simply wanted to prove to myself that I could do a hike.

I expected to be slow.  I expected my foot to hurt.  None of that really happened.  It was 0.75 miles to the Lower Bells Reservoir (my destination) and I was able to reach it in about 27 minutes!  In peak performance, it typically would take me 15-20 minutes to get that far.  My pace hadn't slowed that much!  I was taking a little bit of extra time navigating the parts of the trail with rocks, just to be careful.  I brought along my trekking poles and they helped with balance.  My foot actually didn't hurt very much at all.  I could feel muscles working that I hadn't used in a very long time, though, especially on the uneven ground.  We got to the Reservoir and I wanted to go a bit further, so we did a lap around.  We followed the trail mostly, but took a wrong turn and ended up in a swampy, muddy mess.  I was really dirty by the end, but it was all so much fun!  The only part I struggled with was getting back onto the actual trail - we ended up having to bushwhack a bit to get back to the top.  I still have been struggling with calf raises and coming up on my toes in general, and found myself having to boulder up and be on my toes.  I can't say that it was "painful" but it was kind of an uncomfortable feeling trying to push off the right foot.  Like a muscle that you are overstretching or trying to lift something that is too heavy.  I think that it was good that I pushed my limit a little bit, hoping to get that part back to normal eventually!

I was most terrified of going downhill, actually.  So, I thought it would be a slow and painful process and that it would take forever.  But, I didn't!  I did slow my pace down some because I felt a little anxious and really wanted to be careful not to slip or slide down the trail, but the foot held up awesomely.  I used my poles a lot to steady myself coming down.  By the time we made it back to the trailhead, my foot was starting to get pretty sore, mainly in my navicular area.  I think it was going all kinds of crazy angles and just working my foot out in a way that hadn't been done in a while!

Bell's Canyon - Lower Reservoir

I switched to my flip flops after the hike, and getting my foot out of my hiking boot was a bit difficult since it had kind of swollen up a bit.  But really, no real pain.  I expected to be sore for the rest of the day, and while I could tell I'd had activity, I was really surprised how not sore I actually was!  This made me very excited!  I am very encouraged, and thinking already about what I want my hike next week to be.

Update:  I woke up the next morning, a bit sore, but nothing terrible, and nothing I couldn't handle.  I didn't even need to take advil or pain meds, or anything to get through the next day.

I am super pumped!