Sunday Run (3)

Endomondo Running Workout

We ran upstream along the Cooks River this AM, up to South Strathfield, by which time the river is a mere drain, enclosed between concrete banks, with, I should say, provision for a deal of overflow, none of which was in evidence this morning. So far, Sydney's inner west remains resolutely unflooded. It's really an excellent run, most of the time the parkland around the river is broad enough to exclude the suburbs; when it's not, well, the suburbs provide a little relief from all that green. Not that the 20th century is invisible; the whole left bank (looking downstream, that's the tradition apparently) is built over a high-pressure pipeline, of which the only evidence is numerous signs saying "Do not dig". Nonetheless, dogs are not banned. At various points, high tension pylons occupy odd weedy corners, but I quite like them. After all, the electricity has to come from somewhere; it would be odd to live in a world that was wholly indistinguishable from the 19th century.

Mind you, some of the paths under the multiplicity of bridges were built for 19th century heights. It is quite difficult, at the 16K point, to have to run bent double to avoid breaking one's skull on the bottom of a bridge. (It was more manageable at the 4K point on the way out) Running over one bridge we heard a splash of such magnitude that we felt obliged to stop; there was a school of fish (not in itself so unusual) the largest of which was well up to the 50 cm. mark - I didn't stop to catch it, so you can assume that's more-or-less true. That is much bigger than anything I've seen in there before, they're usually around to 10-15 cm. mark. Suddenly the fisherman don't look so pointless, although it remains to be seen whether you could actually eat it safely. I caught a flathead in the George's River once, and the person who ate it (not me!) is still alive. Still the George's River is wider, and the pollution presumably less concentrated.

The only problem with running along rivers is that I live on a hill. Assuming the technology is not lying, the river gets down to 10m above sea level (how does that work, given tides? There must be some theoretical sea level that doesn't move around) and I have to run over a 72m hill to get home. I realise that to a Sherpa a 60-odd meter rise is probably still within the definition of flat land, but people who know me will be aware that I am not a Sherpa. Those 60m are hard work, especially since you have to run up them multiple times. And running downhill with my knees doesn't constitute a reward, either. If you look at the link you can see the gradient of the run; it feels as steep as it looks!