shouldn't 'meadows' be flat?

plans to run in pt. magu got scraped in exchange for a local trail run with the octr folks.  jess, greg and dimitri showed up at aliso creek & wood canyon.  greg was going to do a long 22-24 mile run, but jess, dimitri and i were opting for something a little bit shorter.

greg's suggestion to run the 'meadows trail' sounded...pastoral.  that was, until we saw the climb that the trail went up.  for at least a mile, we hammered along some pretty stinkin' steep single-tracked switchbacks.  it was tough.  i'd have walked if greg wasn't there to motivate me to keep running.  the climb was a nice 800' and made more difficult with fog hiding the top.  each turn revealed a new, steep section to navigate and it seemed like it would never end.

once at the top, the four of us headed over to 'top of the world' and headed down the ridge line toward cholla.  greg split off at the infamous 'stair step' trail and headed on to laguna coast wilderness park while the rest of us continued on to our decent into main canyon.  at the top of cholla, dimitri and i took off sprinting down the single track.  dimitri was hooting and hollering like a kid and i couldn't help but join in. 

the three of us finished up the great run together.  jessica had her longest run since her injury and looked great and strong the whole time.  it was a blast to hook back up with the octr folks again.

and greg?  i'm thinking you really are the lovechild of sunny bono and tori spelling...