How did you start 2012?

Isn't it funny how we pick a day and crown it special? Some days have actual significance in astronomy or history, but January 1st ought to be just another ordinary day but it is not. For no real reason it gets more attention than most any other day on the calendar. We celebrate it, make promises to ourselves, send wishes to friends and family, shoot fireworks, and then... go back to our pre-resolution lives. And yet I like New Year Eve and Day, if I am awake, that is.

This year, a quiet New Year welcoming at home highlight was a nap. OK, not really but I have to confess to crashing. So maybe I did not sleep well the night before, but such minor inconveniences never used to stop me from staying up the following night. Not this year. By 9pm I knew I wasn't going to make it unless I got some z's. I am proud to say that I did wake up just in time for a couple of small glasses of champagne. And then... like a true party animal that I am, I went back to sleep. 

But for me the New Year really started when I woke up four hours later. I got inspired to do a sunrise hike on Mission Peak, my training grounds John Muir Trail last year, and the tallest mountain (2,400ft or so) reasonable distance from where I live. I've done many sunrise hikes there and even made hike-in-the-dark-friends. This time, I was sure, the mountain would be all mine because who, I thought, in their right mind would go hiking right after New Year celebrations? Definitely nobody in my family. 

Coffee (gotta have coffee), short drive, and I am at the trailhead looking for... a parking spot. I am not kidding, most spots were taken by other insomniacs, crazies, zombies, you name it. So much for feeling so special and superior. 

I decided to power hike as a good start of the year and because the winds on that mountain tend to be very, very cold and I just had to forget my fleece. The start was pretty slow, which I blamed on the lingering effects of champagne, but then I found my rhythm and plowed ahead. The morning was surprisingly warm with a gentle breeze and clear skies. The trailhead starts practically at sea level so I had some climbing to do with practically no flat stretches. This is what makes this mountain so perfect for training. But since I have not done any power hiking in ages, I was surprised, when I made it to the top, that I was off my time record only by a couple of minutes. Maybe champagne is a good fuel after all. Hmm...

There were a lot of people (no zombies though) at the top, all watching the sky change colors and waiting for the sun to come up. It was a perfect morning, one of the warmest I have ever experienced there. There was some fog in the valleys but not enough to obscure amazing views. 

And when the sun came up, gray this time of year hills, turned golden. Pure magic.

I decided to go back on a different trail, so I would have some uphill sections as I ran, my first run of the year, maybe not a very long one but fun. But that was not all for this day. I still wanted to do some biking, 20miles or so. Now when I say "I", I mean my upper body wanted to do biking; my legs did not but they had very little to say in that matter so another short drive and off we went biking, my bitching legs and I. Later my behind joined my legs in endless complaints but I decided to just ignore them. 

   

By noon I was home, showered, with all my photos uploaded eating on breakfast, or maybe it was lunch. 

If this is not a perfect way to start a New Year, I don't know what is.