Another week of morning walks!

I did it! I walked for an hour every morning before work, for a second week!

In attempting to build a new habit, I’ve altered my approach very little. One thing I changed – I really don’t like being woken up by alarms. I usually have my Apple watch on the charger all night, but now I’m charging it during the day so I can wear it at night and use the alarm on my watch instead. It doesn’t make any noise, it just vibrates on my wrist. MUCH better than an auditory alarm. Less startling.

I’ve switched my nighttime routine to start winding up my day and heading to bed in the 9pm hour to be asleep a bit earlier. I’m tired so it helps. I’ve been walking Hank 3-4 km every night too so I’m usually over 13 thousand steps by bedtime and I’m still getting used to this.

Every morning was about 7-8°C when I headed out. It’s getting darker in the morning too!

I’ll share some photos I snapped as I walked.

One morning a flock of geese were flying southeast above me!

My goal is to walk much more briskly than a normal walk. That way I’m getting the cardiovascular benefits and I’m pushing myself. It leaves me pretty stiff still but it feels awesome.

My tally for the 5 mornings this week is 5 hours and 7 minutes of walking. I walked 25.8 km (16 miles). Every day I was able to walk 5km or more in an hour, which feels like a decent pace considering the rocks, sand, sticks, spiderwebs, and hills. I wonder if I can continue to improve this pace?

A couple mornings the tourists were lined up for the ferry in their RVs, waiting to head for Alaska. Look at this rig I spotted! An RV pulling another trailer! Big family? Or did someone’s truck break down? I’ll never know.

I get out of the house at 6:26am each morning. There are so many people also up and going to work or packing up their RV or van for another day of travel. Who knew? haha

One of the best parts are the morning smells. Like the smell of wood fire smoke coming out of a few stovepipes in town in the morning, like from Henry little’s old log cabin on 8th. Then there are a few places where you walk through a cloud of the heavenly scents of pancakes, maple syrup, and bacon. Once I caught the scent of bread baking. Mmmmmmm…

I walked three mornings on the lower dyke, right along the river, which is easier at this time of the year when the river levels have dropped. In the spring the lower dyke is under the river in places.

I don’t like taking the same route each day, but this dyke trail (upper or lower) is a solid 3km so it is hard to skip to zig zag the streets in this little town instead.

I see fewer people from this lower dyke trail because I can’t see all the trucks going by or the people heading into various restaurants and coffee shops for breakfast, but it’s nice and peaceful along the river. I’ve never met anyone down here on this trail in the morning.

There are sections along the river where most of the trees were wiped out by ice during the spring breakup the last couple of springs, which helps the view.

It’s been breezy most mornings, at least along the river. I’m still in shorts, which feels cold when I start, but my legs soon get numb. haha! A big baggy sweatshirt keeps me warm by trapping some heat in.

I feel like this is going to get significantly more difficult as it gets cold and dark, but we’ll see!

I keep taking similar shots along the river. Every morning it is a bit different though! I caught the Amelia Lupine barge heading out one day. A gold miner owns it and shuttles equipment, vehicles, and fuel on it to their mining operations.

Most mornings at the Westmark hotel, they are lining all the suitcases along the sidewalk by 7:30 when I’m finishing my walk. These are all the cruise ship folks who take a side trip to Dawson for a night or two. I suspect they have to have their suitcase on the sidewalk by a certain time, and then they head over to the breakfast hall while it is loaded up. Then they are bussed south to Skagway or bussed just out to the airport to hop on their chartered jet back to Fairbanks.

And now we’re heading into our 3 day Yukon long weekend for Discovery Day! I take weekends off from early morning walks. Weekends are for sleeping in!