Press Release 3/28/20

The Inaugural “Hunker Down” Marathon took place on a balmy 20-degree day today on the Anchorage trail system. There was 1 participant, Jen Novobilski, who was also acting as the race director. “I couldn’t get it together to advertise the event, make bibs or order T-shirts,” Novobilski admits, “but it was a great day for the event!” The race started after Novobilski finished her morning bagel and coffee, around 10:50 am on Saturday morning. The start line was set up in Novobilski’s living room. “It was a pretty low key event” she recalled. “I kissed my wife goodbye and I was off.”

Candace and I have been weekend warriors all summer. We traveled quite a bit for camping and hiking, biking and running. But September proved to be the travel month for races, bringing us many miles of road tripping to run.

t’s been a while since I’ve written, and I wanted to bring the blog back to tell you all about my adventurous summer! Best place to start is the present, so I’ll let you in on one of my favorite places in Alaska- McCarthy-Kennecott.

When I started writing my blog this summer, I was focusing on my adventures away from my beautiful home, Anchorage Alaska. Now that my sabbatical from work is coming to a close, I’m going to focus my writing about our Alaskan adventures. 

On my way to Nepal, I had an 8-hour layover in Dubai. Rather that spending this time at the airport, I decided to book a city tour. I arranged a private tour through “Withlocals”, with Gomez as my tour guide.

Everest Base Camp Trek, the last adventure of my sabbatical from work. This trip has been on my bucket list ever since I watched the Everest Movie, Into Thin Air, in the late 1990s. The village of Namche Bazaar was especially intriguing to me.

I was still taking the antimalarial medications from the Africa trip when I left for Utah in September. This was the trip I was most excited for when planning my summer hiatus from work.

When I decided to take my sabbatical from work, I thought it might be a good time to travel out of the country. It seems most people go to Europe when they have a significant amount of time to travel. My wife and I are more into roughing it!

I have traveled through three different time zones upon the completion of this leg of my trip. It is also the further East that I will travel, just beyond Medora, North Dakota. Prior to my arrival though, I did stop at Stella’s bakery for some wonderful herbed cheese bread in Billings.

I’ve been in Montana now for 13 days, this state is as rugged as it gets. I picture the olden days of a simpler life when I look upon the landscape.

I anticipated an early start out of Coeur d’Alene, but it didn’t happen. I did wake up early to hit a trail unknown to me near the campground for my interval run. That didn’t happen either! I

Chaos occurred on the ferry prior to driving off, a fire alarm and possibly a fire broke out after we docked. I watched several fire trucks make their way to the ferry terminal.  After grabbing a latte and quickly reconnecting with the outside world, I made my way to Highway 20, the North Cascades.

It all started when my wife told me to dream big. “Dream Big?” I said, “Do you really mean that? Or are you just saying that?” "No, I mean it," she says. “Because if you’re going to tell me to dream big, I’m gonna do it!” A year later, I quit my job.