Adventures in Camping

All week Thomas had been excited to go camping once he got off work on Friday.  He got home, we packed everything up, and we were out.  The place we went to is only about a 10-15 minute drive from home.  We had looked at the forecast the night before and it said there was a chance of rain but we figured we could handle it.  Once we got there, at about 5pm, Thomas started working on getting the fire going.  We were excited because instead of having to buy wood we got some from the local park where they had been cutting down some old trees.  I set up the HUGE tent of Bea and Ivan's (they were meeting us there later).  We decided to set the tent up under the pavilion in case it did rain in the night.  As Thomas was preparing the fire I kept asking him "Are you sure this is a good idea? I see lightning?  Can lightning strike us when we are under a pavilion?"  He reassured me and I could tell that he really wanted this camping trip to workout so I let it be.  About 45 minutes after we got there the wind picked up BIG time! The tent flew through the pavilion towards the fire.  Thomas blocked it in front and I pulled it back from the back.  That's when we decided to head home.  Luckily a guy and his wife drove by right about then and he came and helped us becuase that tent was so huge and the wind was so strong we could barely keep it on the ground!  We had even put the cooler and all our other gear in the tent to hold it down and had one side of it staked to the ground but it still was flying away! We hurried and packed everything up and called Bea and Ivan to tell them not to bother heading out there. 
So Friday night we ended up cooking our foil dinners in the oven instead of over a campfire and we hung out at Bea and Ivan's watching New in Town (one of my favorite movies).
We did add to our camping collection and got an air mattress with a built in air pump.  So we'll have to have another go at camping so we can try it out. 
I would have taken a picture of the tent blowing away but we needed all hands to help hold it down. 

This is kind of what it looked like but there were only a couple of us to hold it down.

State of Playing

Running Schedule from this week:

Monday: 4.56 miles ( 2x1miles at 10k pace with 800 recovery jog, 6x200m at 5k pace with 200 recovery jog)

Tuesday: 3.25 mile easy

Total Time 29:06 Avg Pace 8:57

Wednesday: 6.16 miles total (4 miles race pace, ½ mile jog, 1 mile 10K pace, 6x100)

Thursday: Off

Friday: 5 miles easy

Total time: 46:32 Avg Pace: 9:18

Saturday: Off

Sunday: 11.07 mile long run

Total Mileage= 30 miles
Friday I knew we would be going up camping as soon as I was done with work so I did a morning run.  I NEVER do morning runs.  I am soo not a morning person.  I guess I can handle getting up at 6:30am once a year or so though.
I usually don’t run on Sundays but I made an exception this week. We were camping Friday night and didn’t sleep the best so I figured I’d swap rest days.  I felt really great on the 11 miler.  I ran from our apartment to my parents house plus some.  It was fun running from one point to another rather then an out and back which is what I usually do.  I stopped at mile 7.5 at a grocery store to use the bathroom and get some water and ate a Powerbar Gel Strawberry Banana.  

I liked this brand just as much as GU or Hammer Gel. I didn't really feel like I needed it but I want to get myself use to using it for the race. 
I got like 10 Powerbar Gels for .39 cents each at GNC.  I'm pretty sure they are on sale cause the sell by date is at the end of June.  It was a steal, cause normally the energy gels are like 2 bucks!
I finished in 1:43, I was expecting to run about a 1:50.  I just ran what felt comfertable and glanced minimally at the Garmin.

Camping was way fun. It was a really last minute decision. Thursday night Thomas and I were talking about what we were going to do this weekend. We really wanted to go wakeboarding but the weather has been gloomy and rainy. So we decided to call up Camp Z and see if they had any cabins available. All the cabins were booked but they had just put up canvas platform tents. The platforms are made of wood and raised about 6 inches from the ground so it wouldn’t be a problem if the ground got wet.

We really like Camp Z. It is a church run camp so it is super cheap cause they aren’t trying to make a profit. Thirty dollars a night for a cabin, fifteen dollars a night for a tent. Plus they supply the wood for your campfire, it’s free to use the canoes, and you don’t have to worry about drunk loud neighbors because there is no alcohol aloud. And it’s only about an hour’s drive.

So we invited some of our friends who came last time camping and our friends Kasey and John were able to come. You know what I love about camping? Besides the camping gear, you really don’t have to pack much. You don’t have to bring a ton of different changes of clothes, no makeup, no hair straightener, and no blow dryer.

John and Kasey being assaulted by the smokey fire.

Thomas and I got there a little before them (about 5pm) so we started getting a fire ready. I really don’t have any experience in starting fires. You’d think starting a fire would be easy. I mean you hear about random forest fires starting all the time. But it took us at least an hour to get one going. We didn’t bring any newspaper up so we were using yellow sticky notes from my purse to try to get the flame burning a little more. Those didn’t work too well so we went up and asks the camp caretakers for some newspaper. (I just added that to the “camping list” that I have saved on the computer for future trips). We did get it going before John and Kasey got there around 6:45.

For dinner Thomas had made some delicious foil dinners and roasted hot dogs. For the foil dinners Thomas cut up carrots, potatoes, and chicken tenders and added about a tablespoon of butter and some Creole seasoning wrapped it all on foil and stuck it over the fire. They were so yummy! I guess the key is to cut all the ingredients up into small pieces so it cooks quickly. We are going to have them again this week but just stick them in the stove.

My Hubby is so special!

I ate so many sweets this weekend! Another reason I didn’t want to run Saturday. And a reason I really NEED to run on Sunday. We had licorice, peanut butter M&M’s, Bottle Caps, Mike and Ike’s, and b-day cake. Kasey’s b-day is on Sunday so we celebrated a bit early.

Birthday Girl Kasey!

Friday night we hung out around the fire eating and talking and then when it got really dark headed into the tent to play games. We played one round of Apples to Apples and then we were all tired and we conked out. I wore my sweats of my jeans to bed, plus a sweatshirt, coat and gloves. In the middle of the night I got hot and ended up taking of the sweats and coat and gloves. Also needed a middle of the night potty trip. Those are fun. Stumbling through the woods half asleep, tripping over tent stakes.

In the morning we had bagels with cream cheese and some breakfast burritos. Sat around the fire some more, played a little “Would you rather?” (I know we are supposed to be adults but hey… what else do you do in the middle of the woods). Then we played some rounds of the card game “Idiot”. Just a fun relaxing time.

Keeping warm inside the tent by playing some games.

That's really John's weiner I'm roasting.  I just needed a prop.

We got home 2:30pm. Showered and conked out for a couple hours. I don’t know why camping is so exhausting!

Went out to dinner at my fave Mexican restaurant El Porton and then rented a Redbox. Okay we NEVER get good movies from Redbox; they always end up being super cheesy. But we finally found a winner. State of Play with Ben Affleck, Russell Crowe, and Rachel McAdams. It was a really great show about this congressman and an investigation into the murder of his mistress. I would recommend it.