Saturday, May 13, 2006

May 12 - Ivanhoe to South Yarra via Gippsland (..just about)

I learnt a very important lesson today - when you are running in an unfamiliar area, study the proposed route carefully. Especially if you are running in the dark!

Tonight was supposed to be a run friom Ivanhoe east along the Yarra to Burke Road, then south down Burke Road to the Whitehorse rail trail. From there to follow the rail trail all the way down and along the Alamein train line. Just past Ashburton Station I would cut back west and join up to the Gradiners Creek path and finally along the Yarra Trail back to South Yarra.

It went fine until I joined the Whitehorse rail train and managed to find myself running further east along Canterbury Road. Once I got to Union Road I realised I was going the wrong way, but continued on to Warrigal Road and then turned down Toorak Road and followed that for it's entirety back to South Yarra.

In all it actually wasn't a bad run, although stopping too often for traffic was a pain, and there were a few pretty good hills! The run was just over 24kms and I completed it in 2h30m, which with the numerous stops for traffic lights was reasonably good.

Next time I slip a small map into my pocket though!