Miles and Miles of Mountains and Mud: Whiteface Vertical Weekend

"There's no way around the ankle deep water, and the best bet is always a straight line, right? The shortest distance between two points. And oh yeah, I guess I couldn't get any wetter if I tried, so into the water I go. In fact, I might as well use the buckets of rain to rinse the mud and blood from my legs so I can ascertain the damage. Just as I hoped, it's merely road rash down the front of my legs and nothing serious."

At this precise moment, the shear absurdity of the situation struck me and I couldn't help but laugh. I had already climbed 4000 feet up the Whiteface ski slopes and back down the other side in a rainstorm, with the top half of the mountain blanketed in mud. The slow ascent wasn't terrible, but it was tedious to carefully place every footfall where I could find the most traction, which was to say very little. Several dozen pairs of shoes had already tread the ground on the mountain's upper half, churning up the knee deep mud really nice. Unprepared for the storm, the only jacket I had brought along was a windbreaker I bought at an auxiliary sale at work for $10. Not quite ideal for keeping warm and dry during a rain storm at 4,500 feet.

It was the descent that had nearly killed me, sliding down every which way, falling more times than I ever had in my life - sometimes sliding into rocks and tearing skin off my legs in the process. Now here I was on the relatively flat Flume Loop before another identical ascent and descent of the mountain. And wasn't that Stevie Kramer, passing in the opposite direction, than just assured me I was heading the right way when I thought I may have taken a wrong turn? I mean SkyRunning world