Deer Run

Brian and I went out to the Cuyahoga Valley today to do a run. We knew it would be a really cold one since the high was supposed to be in the 20's. The thing that made it really bad was the wind though. When we went down in valleys it didn't feel too bad, but up on the ridges it was very windy.

We started at Kendall Lake and headed up onto the trail towards Camp Manatoc. Right when we got on the trail, we saw a deer not too far from us. Then we saw another one and two more in the distance. We decided to go off-piste a little and try to follow the deer. We did for awhile, but then they got too far away, so we started running along the yellow-marked trail that the Boy Scouts made. We ran this with Jim and his son Heath on New Year's Eve, but it looked a lot different now with no snow on the ground. The valleys and hills on this trail are amazing. The only thing is that some of the trail is not kept up and has a lot of fallen trees and brush. Below is a video of a deer running away after Brian scared it.

Early on in the run, we heard some people yelling. We went up on a ridge and saw that there were some people at Camp Manatoc. We figured some scouts must be camping or having a get together but thought it was kind of funny considering how cold it was. We looped around on the yellow trail and ended up on the other side of the camp. We could see tents set up and a fire going. After that, we got to Rt. 303 and took some funny pictures with the big chief statue at the entrance of the camp.

After goofing around there, we headed out on Rt. 303 for a little bit until we got to the Happy Days Visitor Center. We got back onto the trail by the ledges and headed back towards Kendall Lake. We ended up with only 6 miles, but it was a very enjoyable run (other than the cold) and it was fun to see all the deer running around out there with us!