herd it through the grapevine

stockton, oh stockton.  you never cease to bring adventure, intrigue and drama.  some cowboy should write a song about you.  let me get one thing off my chest and then i'll dive into the story about my trail adventure.

in the history of hotel management have the words, "hey, let's let a live band play in the atrium bar until 1:30am" ever resulted in happy guests?

okay.  the run.  21stcenturymom made a suggestion about mt. diablo or del valle regional park for a decent trail run.  checking the map and making note of the time i had available, del valle seemed the better choice.  so, after a lousy night's sleep (see above paragraph), i was up at 5 and on my way to the park.  i found the parking lot okay, but realized that the parking meter only took ones and instead of a parking fee of $6, i only had to pay $2.  i had a $5 and a $1.  oops.  back into town i drove, split my $5 and headed back to the parking lot. 

by this time, the sky had lightened a bit, and i could see hillside after hillside of vinyards.  ooh.  pretty!  i had no idea what the route would end up offering, but if i was going to run through vinyards, that was okay by me.  back at the parking lot, i discovered that the parking meter was actually broken and i didn't need to feed it cash after all.  i stuck my two $1's under the wind shield wiper and headed off.

from what i could see in the dim light and overcast sky, the route wound up a HUGE hill and off into rolling hills.  no vinyards, but beautiful, oak dotted, green hills.  i climbed the monster in the first mile and was greeted with a view of a long valley, flanked by steep rolling hills and filled with a serene, glassy lake.  i was kicking myself for not bringing the camera.

i cruised along the trail, following the shore line and climbing up and down the spurs that dropped down into the lake.  around mile four, i rounded a corner and was greeted by a couple cows.  ooh!  cows!  moo, cow, moo!  i slipped into thunderclap speak and began telling the cows things they already knew.  "you say moo!"  "you give milk!"  "you're a hamburger!"

i slowed to a walk so as not to disturb their early morning grazing.  what i didn't notice, though, was that on one side of the trail was a black calf happily munching on the grass and on the other side of the trail was her now agitated mother.  momma took a couple steps toward me and moo'ed loudly.  i stopped.  she took another step toward me and moo'ed again.  the other cows on the hillside were now all looking and began responding with their own moo's.  oh dear. 

i went off trail and tried to walk wide around the mom/baby combo, but she would have none of it and continued to take steps toward me and moo loudly every time i moved.  the other cows were now joining in with a cacophony of moo's and i thought for sure that at any moment the bull was going to show up and i'd be in real trouble.  now, i'm not afraid of cows, per se, but if it's me vs. a heifer, i think i'm going to loose just on basic physics.  so, i made the wise choice.

i slowly backed away up the trail and waited for a hiker i had passed on the last climb.  when he showed up, the two of us made a united front and walked bravely toward the momma.  fortunately, she trotted across the trail, gathered up her calf and moved up the hillside, letting us pass.

i continued on the run, and only ran into a couple more cows, none of which presented any issues.  the route wound through oak groves, up and down hills, down into coves and up onto bluffs overlooking the lake.  the morning, aside from the bovine adventure, was fantastic.  the legs were a little wiped, most likely because i was just plain tired, but the hills, the trees, the lake, the birds, yes, even the cows, made that a faint niggle in the back of my mind.

thanks for the suggestion, 21st!  i'm sure i'll be back if i'm ever subjected to stockton, oh stockton again.

Posted by jeff at April 1, 2008 09:47 AM