FKT: Jared Loertscher - Boise Skyline Traverse - 2023-11-18

I started at about 6 am on Saturday at the Highland Valley Trailhead. I took that trail to the top of Lucky Peak at a power-walking pace and made it to the top at around 7:40 am. I did make a small wrong turn near the base of the trail which added a little bit of time and distance. At the top, I had a Clif bar and then continued on Boise Ridge Rd until mile 9 where I met up with Shaw Mountain Rd at Adalpe Pass. I met a couple of runners there who were training for Race to Robie Creek. We talked for a little bit about how dumb of an idea what I was doing was and then I continued. I continued on Boise Ridge Rd for another 6 or so miles and then I started climbing Boise Peak. Which by the way is the most brush-covered mountain I have ever climbed. The ascent/descent of this mountain easily added 2 hours to the journey. Next time I do this traverse I'll probably end up coming down the same trail I went up to simplify the path and avoid getting absolutely destroyed by a bunch of stupid bushes. There's not an easily identified Highpoint on Boise Peak so I used a GPS to get as close as I could. But on the plus side, I found a cool knife so you win some and you lose some. Anyway, once I Bushwacked off of Boise Peak I made my way back to Boise Ridge Rd(I'm beginning to wonder if I misnamed this route:/). I followed that road until I got to the Deer Point Chairlift at Bogus Basin. Honestly, at this point, I was in pretty bad shape. Up to that point I had been fueling with gu's, Clif bars, water, and the occasional salt pill, but at the chairlift, I had to bring out the big guns... Nerds gummy clusters!! After a couple of handfuls of these bad boys, I got my energy back and found my way to the top of Shafers Butte via the fire road and a little scramble on the rocks on the northeast face cause I was feeling adventurous. After pausing at the top for a little bit I ate more nerds and ran down one of my favorite switchback trails at Bogus(I was surprised that there was a light dusting of snow on the trails). Using a handful of trails and roads after the switchbacks I made my way to the parking lot. They were doing an event at the terrain park, that just opened, and for a minute I thought I might've chosen the wrong weekend activity, but I powered through and made my way down Bogus Basin Rd. Where I had a bucket filled with food and water cached(at around mile 26). I made a freeze-dried meal with a stove I had in my cache and restocked my backpack. I felt so bad at this point and the food helped but not a lot. I ended up waiting about 30-45 minutes sitting on the side of the road waiting to see if I'd feel better. I kinda felt better at some point and so I proceeded down the road until I made it to Pat's trail. I followed Pat's trail until it met up with Eastside trail. I started feeling really off at around mile 33 on Eastside and got scared to death by some very nice mountain bikers who came up behind me. I was just super loopy but I think I was probably just getting hungry cause after some more nerd clusters I felt a little better. Eventually, I made it to Stack Rock Trail and I slowly made my way up the steep sections of the trail. When I got to the base of stack rock I took a short breather and water break then I climbed to the top of the iconic pile of rock. To be honest I was so tired and wobbly at this point that I felt like this was a very difficult task but in reality, it's maybe a class 3 scramble. At the top, I stopped and pondered life and my poor decisions then I gave up on that and headed down. It was about 3:30 at this point and I knew I was going to run out of daylight in a couple hours so I tried to pick up the pace, and of course, I had some more nerds gummy clusters. The next section of the trail sucks. I had run this trail a handful of times and it follows the ridge down to a dirt road that meets up with Sweet Connie's trail, but it sucks! The trail is stupid hard to find maybe next time I'll avoid coming down this trail and add a couple of miles to meet up with Connies earlier. By the time I got down to Connie's trail, I was not doing good at all. This was the longest distance I'd ever run and my body was unhappy. Through the power of nerds gummy clusters and salt pills, I made it down the majority of Connies. I made a wrong turn somewhere and got lost but I retraced my steps and got to Peggys Trail. I wasn't planning on using Peggys but it was the most obvious way out so I took it. Peggys turned out well except it made me travel another couple hundred vertical feet and I was dying by the end of the climb. I made it to the Cartwright Road crossing as the sun had gone all the way down. It was getting cold at that point and I thought about having someone pick me up right there, but with maybe 3 miles left I decided I could make it. I ran through Polecat Gulch Reserve up and down Quickdraw and out to the Collister Trailhead. I wish I could say that this was an easy last couple of miles but they were awful. I was freezing and refused to wear my jacket because I was so close to being done. I also heard wolves or coyotes howling and was convinced they were chasing me in the dark. When I got to the trailhead I even walked right past my ride cause I didn't recognize them at all. But hey I got it done! Not nearly as fast as planned, and not nearly as well put together, but done nonetheless. I ended up accidentally adding 2-3 miles onto the course from getting lost or going on suboptimal trails. I had a lot of fun with this course tho, and while it's not an exceptionally fast time I'm glad I got to establish a route. I was inspired to try this route after looking at the Lower Foothills Traverse. Next year I plan on attempting this route again trying to get a much faster time, in the meantime, I hope more runners try this route and see how low the time can get. Best of luck! ps in case you haven't yet figured this out I may or may not be obsessed with nerds gummy clusters. I think they might be the ideal endurance fuel/snack!