Just 4 minutes rest

Returning to the Waterfall Gully hike, we got our best rest time ever - just 4 minutes.

Mt Lofty Summit to Waterfall Gully and return

54 Seconds

The 54 second stop on the way downhill rests squarely on Kate and Tim's shoulders. They were slow, I had to wait for them - twice - otherwise the stop time would have been zero.

After a 6 week break - where I have been hiking or away - we returned to our training route of Mt Lofty Summit to Waterfall Gully. We did well, although I was a bit sore the next day. Not sure what was going on there? Evidently the hiking over the past 5 weekends was not enough... not sure, it could have just by evil body. (the last 5 weekends - to justify: April 25 - camping, April 13 - ABW hike, April 20 - Heysen Trail catch-up hike, May 4 - Heysen Trail catch-up, May 11 - Heysen Trail catch-up)

Anyway, a nice latte at the top today.

Training times improve

Beating our best times down towards our goal-times

Waterfall Gully to Mount Lofty Summit

We hiked the week after our 4-day Easter hike, improving our uphill time by 3 minutes - our first significant improvement in uphill moving time (we've only previously made improvements in our stationary uphill times). Tim carried a heavy pack, Kate did not and nor did I (I didn't feel that great so opted out of the pack-carrying). We also set a goal to reach by December - 45 minutes uphill with 5 minutes stationary.

The following week, Tim was away in the Flinders, leaving Kate and I to hike. It made more logistical sense in terms of driving to meet at the summit and hike down to Waterfall Gully before returning back up. Physcologically this seemed harder, but perhaps due to that and our improved fitness (?) we significantly improved our times - beating both our downhill and uphill times by 6 minutes each to 34 and 48 minutes respectively, and reducing our stationary uphill time from 14 minutes to 10 minutes. We think we hiked faster downhill because we weren't tired from the uphill, and then we hiked back uphill faster because we were already warmed up and had been hiking fast. There might be something in that.

View a map from a previous day of the same hike.

Stats: Sat 29 March

Uphill: Waterfall Gully to Mt Lofty Summit Distance: 3.89km Moving duration: 52m (last time 55m) Stationary duration: 14m (last time 14m) Moving average: 4.4km/h (last time 4.2km/h) Overall average: 3.4km/h (last time 2.9km/h) Max Speed: 8.9km/h

Downhill: Mt Lofty Summit to Waterfally Gully Distance: 3.7km Moving duration: 45m (last time 40m) Stationary duration: 1m (last time 3m) Overall average: 4.9km/h Max Speed: 14.7km/h

Stats: Sat 5 April

Downhill: Mt Lofty Summit to Waterfally Gully Distance: 3.36km Moving duration: 34m Stationary duration: 1m Moving average: 5.9km/h Overall average: 5.5km/h

Uphill: Waterfall Gully to Mt Lofty Summit Distance: 3.36km Moving duration: 48m Stationary duration: 10m Moving average: 4.6km/h Overall average: 3.8km/h

Packs this time

Back to the Waterfall Gully hike - but this time with heavy packs

Waterfall Gully to Mount Lofty Summit

Kate and Tim slept on my bedroom floor in my 30 degree house so we could set out early on the hot day for our regular hike. Tim and I carried our big packs, loaded with water and rugs and stuff. I think we were about 16kg. Amazingly we did the hike in the same time, just taking an extra few minutes on the way back down, which is expected. Kate led us this time, but she came to the conclusion we would need to start carrying a pack too to keep up with us.

Time Trials

Back again on the Waterfall Gully to Mt Lofty Summit hike - this time to better last week's time, 10 minutes was shaved off

Waterfall Gully to Mt Lofty Summit

Tim was sick for this one, so while he ran errands and waited in the car park Kate and I hiked, bettering last week's time by 10 minutes - reducing the rest time from 25 to 15 minutes. The moving time was the same - see the stats below.

A warm, sunny day, we set off at 9.30am, which was good as we could feel the heat as we climbed out of Waterfall Gully.

Tim and I had planned to load up our large packs with extra weight, weight training so to speak, but I decided not to do so since Tim was sick. Met Ben and Neil at the summit, they are in training for the Kokoda Track, so they too both had heavy packs - laden with water, magazine stashes and dumb-bells wrapped in towels.



Stats:

Uphill: Waterfall Gully to Mt Lofty Summit Distance: 3.9km Moving duration: 55m (last time 55m) Stationary duration: 15m (last time 25m) Moving average: 4.2km/h (last time 4.2km/h) Overall average: 3.3km/h (last time 2.9km/h)

Downhill: Mt Lofty Summit to Waterfally Gully Distance: 3.9km Moving duration: 40m (last time 43m) Stationary duration: 1m (last time 3m) Moving average: 5.9m/h (last time 5.3km/h) Overall average: 5.7km/h (last time 5.0km/h)

Kick-Start the Training Again

Today we started our first training for this year, and where else close to Adelaide but the Waterfall Gully hike to Mt Lofty Summit?

We're excited about our plans to hike the Overland Track, amongst other overnight hikes in Tasmania, in December. So today for some training we hiked from the carpark at Waterfall Gully to the cafe on Mt Lofty summit, where we discussed the other hikes we wanted to do whilst we'll be in Tasmania. We'll be there for 3 weeks across Christmas, so we have decided to start off with a 2 day Walls of Jerusalem hike, followed by 6-7 days on the Overland Track, perhaps 2 days on the nearby Frenchmnas Cap walk, then travel to Hobart for some coastal walks - 2 days on the Cape Pillar track and finishing off with 2 days on the Freycinet Peninsula Circuit.

A popular training hike, Waterfall Gully to Mt Lofty Summit it short but tough. As you can see from the stats below, it's a lot quicker coming back down. We'll use these stats as a benchmark, as we plan to do regular hikes each fortnight on this trail and other challenging hills, perhaps in Morialta and Ambers Gully.

Tim and Kate also tested out their new hiking boots. Both passed, a little bit of lamb's wool around one toe and all good. I took one of my new trekking poles to try out (taking just one, does that make it a walking pole instead?), but didn't need it - I only need one when I injure a knee, which has been often in recent months, but not today. I use two trekking poles when hiking with a full 20kg-ish backpack so I was glad to purchase my new trekking poles which are very cool, lightweight, and a lot better than the two really cheap, heavy, ugly - and quite rattlie - ones I already had.

I have done some hiking over the past few months, however I have been lazy and not uploaded each to my blog. Here is a list of them, dating back from December to now, although the stories with them are a bit slap-dash given they are not quite so fresh in my mind now:

• Belair National Park, 9 February, 2008
  
• Lavender Federation Trail, 20 January, 2008
  
• Lavender Federation Trail, 13 January, 2008
  
• Old Beechy Rail Trail, 27-28 December, 2007
  
• Deep Creek Conservation, 22-24 December, 2007
  
• Heysen Trail: Pewsey Vale to Kapunda, 1-2 December, 2007
  
• Morialta, November, 2007
  

Stats:

Uphill: Waterfall Gully to Mt Lofty Summit Distance: 3.88km Moving duration: 55m Stationary duration: 25m Moving average: 4.2km/h Overall average: 2.9km/h

Downhill: Mt Lofty Summit to Waterfally Gully Distance: 3.88km Moving duration: 43m Stationary duration: 3m Moving average: 5.3km/h Overall average: 5.0km/h