My husband wanted an easy run

Just 20-30 minutes, just two easy loops or whatever.  Instead, we meandered deeper into the forest and hit the Triplet.  Those hills are so steep that the easiest way to get past them is to do it as quickly as possible.  Even walking up them puts me out of breath.  The sand in the valleys between the peaks has become softer; it was tougher than I remembered.

I'm still trying to decide on a training plan for the marathon in early May.  At first, I thought I would do another spin through an older Daniels' plan, because that's worked well in the past, but it wouldn't fit my present terrain as well.  I don't have sidewalks or paved paths or a reliably clear 200-400m stretch of road for sprints, flat or not, but I have the Triplet pretty much all to myself and it will serve pretty much the same purpose.  I have decent 3 mile and 5 mile routes for tempos, the latter with two large hills and smaller ones, plus I can do longer tempos in the forest.  I have a treadmill for VO2 max intervals.  My general plan is to do a few weeks of sprints and modest tempo stuff, to pave the way to tougher lactate threshhold stuff and, shortly before tapering, VO2max stuff...this seems the best way to get into better shape.  I have a good endurance base (presumably the best I've had in my life at this point) and 11 weeks.   My hopes aren't high and the weather will turn against me, but I can get at least a little tighter.

However, the longest I've ever run on a road here is 5 miles, no joke.  Running on the roads here is ok--and the motorists are mostly really decent--but it's not that fun.  Oh, well.  Suck it up.