Trail Rat on the Endless Seven

Trail Rat on the Endless Seven
~Reed “Trail Rat” Nelson~
APRIL 2005
Most rats have run in some pretty exotic places. This rat dares not name his favorite places he has spent his tread. Well, what the heck, maybe a few highlights!
Most Beautiful – The deck of a Royal Caribbean cruise ship for 10K
Hottest – El Corridor Highway in Los Cabos for 5 miles
Coldest – The last Saturday AM club run in Jan 2004 was pretty chilly!
Hilliest – Running out of the New River Gorge in WV in 1996
Flattest – well…
I suppose it is time for a more recent rat tale. Virginia Beach is flat, aside from a few dunes to sprint over. I mean, you really have to be creative. Sometimes you just have to give up and run the flats! Sooooo… back to my handy little biking book I went. Now, you all know they don’t make a lot of bikes for us four-legged types, so I really bought the book to scope out trail runs.
It seems that a long time ago there were a few slaves that escaped and hid out in a nearby swamp. President Washington visited this 1,000,000 acre wetland and decided he would dig a series of ditches and try to drain it. Well, he might as well have spit into the wind! But ole George created some mighty fine roads through the swamp when the ditches and canals were made. In fact, one of the first monuments named after a president resulted. Washington Ditch spans about 4.2 miles from the edge of the swamp to the mysterious Lake Drummond. A raised road was made with the dirt from the ditch. Voila… a trail run!
Now, many of you may think of flats as a blessing. Or, maybe you think they are just plain easy. Me? Despite my four legs I personally struggle with flats. This was a nightmare waiting to unfold. I quick glance at the historical marker and off I went. My girlfriend was with me, so that was a good thing. We started with a brisk walk and advanced into jogging speed. We’re lucky, because we run pretty fast for rats. I’d guess about 6.5mph to begin with, and about 6.7mph as a pace.
At that pace, the scenery is still very observable. From a rat’s view, it was paradise! Wet swamp lands and fallen timbers were everywhere. Ah ah! I forgot to mention that the original 1,000,000 acres had been harvested of timber over the years, and now about 125,000 acres remain. Hey, don’t be sad mister and miss Tree Hugger. The area is in splendid condition and free of logging since the early 1900’s, and still the largest wetland reserve in the eastern US. Anyway, the remnants of past logging is evident in the amount of deadfall and decay. I was so tempted to take my four little legs off-trail. But, custom waders for us rats are expensive, and I only use mine for fly-fishing.
As I looked down the corridor of trees I swore it was just another Hollywood backdrop. It didn’t seem real. But, the grind in my muscles and joints did not vary. The same view. The same feel. Mental entropy occurred [that means chaos], and I was immediately dreaming of our Lake Drummond arrival alternately with the sound of spring traps being activated. You know how that makes a rat feel? Of course you don’t! Silly humans. But, I still noticed the crickets and katydids and all the other delicacies making noise. It really was rat heaven… I felt better. The corridor was interrupted once by an intersecting ditch/road combo. And on it went. And on. But an end appeared to materialize, and as we jogged on, it became real. There was A TURN. Wow! A change of direction! And so as we made the dogleg right another end appeared. Then another dogleg right revealed a massive lake with a landing dock and a free spotting scope.
Lake Drummond is massive. My partner asked me how far it would be to jog around it [if there was a road]. I estimated 20 to 25 miles. It was an impressive sight. Impression depends on perspective. Witness these writings on Lake Drummond
Canoeing Sketches, John Boyle O'Reilly, From: Athletics and Manly Sport, Boston: Pilot Publishing Company, 1890
The Lake of the Dismal Swamp is the very eye of material anguish. Its circle of silvery beach is flooded and hidden, and still the pent-up water, vainly beseeching an outlet, is raised and driven in unnatural enmity to the roots of the tall juniper, cypress, and gum trees, that completely surround its shore. The waves that should murmur and break on a strand of incomparable brilliancy, are pushed beyond their proper limits, and compelled to soften and sap the productive earth; to wash bare and white the sinews of the friendly trees, and inundate a wide region of extraordinary fertility. The bleached roots of the doomed trees seem to shudder and shrink from the weltering death. There is an evident bending upward of the overtaken roots to escape suffocation. The shores of the lake are like a scene from the "Inferno." Matted, twisted, and broken, the roots, like living things in danger, arch themselves out of the dark flood, pitifully striving to hold aloft their noble stems and branches. The water of the lake, dark almost as blood, from the surface flow of juniper sap and other vegetable matter, is forced from six to ten feet above its natural level, and driven by winds hither to this bank to-day and thither to-morrow, washing every vestige of earth from the helpless life-givers, till its whole circumference is a woful net-work of gnarled trunks and intertwined fibres, bleached and dry as the bones of a skeleton, and sheltering no life, but that of the blue lizard and red-throated moccasin.
Well well... that should get you ready to run back to the car… don’t you think???
And so it was that the return would have no walking. The two ruts in the road became the paths to glory. My partner clocked mile two on the return at an 8:30 pace, which just killer for rats. This rat was inspired by her effort and gave extra effort of his own to stay within sight of her. But upon thinking, she could be a mile away and still be seen! Yet, the effort remained high and great strains were made to spot the gate at the parking lot.
We spotted no snakes, bobcats, black bears, or other creatures of fear known to inhabit the reserve. We did startle a herron into flight. I have not seen a herron since canoeing the Current River over a year ago. Anytime a bird with a 6-feet wing span takes off you have to pause mentally. It is a beautiful sight. But there was no physical pause, and soon the dark brown metal and wooden gates appeared in the distance. My partner asked me on a couple of occasions how far away I thought they were. Knowing what she really was asking, I gave her the answer in finishing kick time. “Uh…that’s about a 4 minute finish sprint, baby.” We jogged it home to the car!
It was a long drive in the ratmobile back to our little nest in the wall of a Virginia Beach apartment complex. It gave us time to contemplate about 7.4 miles of Great Dismal agony and ecstasy [and our one mile warm up walk]. As with most rats, our experiences can be summed up in moments. And our moments of sadness and euphoria are what we recall as time goes by. The long straight road to the center of blackness that is the Washington Ditch will always evoke more smiles than frowns.