This fortune is only half right since my job does not require any traveling. Or… maybe it is accurate if I make it my “business” to travel? Hmmm…
Either way…we leave for Iceland in just two short weeks!
Category Archives: Random
The 10K Question
It’s never been much of a secret that I do not enjoy running. When I was in the army, I used to dread having to run 2 miles for the army physical fitness test. So, how is it that I have ended up running a 6.2 mile race, two years in a row… for “fun?” I’ve been asking myself that same question!
The Marine Corps Marathon is held every October in DC & VA. The race begins in Virginia and then winds its way through our nation’s capital, passing a plethora of monuments, before going back into Virginia and then ending at the Marine Corps War Memorial. People travel from all over the world to participate in this event. Even with Hurricane Sandy looming, this year’s Marine Corps Marathon was the largest yet!
In addition to the marathon, the Marine Corps hosts a 10K that begins along the National Mall and also ends at the famous Marine Corps War Memorial in Arlington, VA. Without any prior planning and/or proper training, I have managed to run this race two years in a row. Last year, my friend Heather asked if I would like to run with her because the person she was supposed to run with could no longer participate. The thought of running 6 miles was terrifying, but I didn’t want her to have to run it alone, so I decided I would give it a shot. It actually ended up being a lot of fun…despite all the pain from the actual running part of it. I rarely run further than 2 miles, so at about mile 4, my body started to let me know it was very unhappy with me. But, the course was lined with people cheering you on. In addition to regular citizens, there were also marines lined up in uniform ready to give you high-fives. Now that is what I call motivation! Even though I am sure we both wanted to walk the rest of the way, we stuck it out and we finished the race together.
About six months later, the registration for this year’s race opened up and Heather asked if I would like to run with her again. Ummm….no thanks. I tend to have a bucket list-type mentality. Meaning, if I have already checked that box, there is no real need to do it again. However, fast forward to 4 days before the race and I am somehow volunteering to run 6.2 miles again. This time, I am not feeling compelled to run out of friendly duty. Heather was running with her friend Andrea, so I was under no obligation to help a friend in need. But, after realizing that there was a bib up for grabs, I basically jumped at the opportunity to run again this year. Why? The truth…I have no idea!
It was pretty much the same as last year (although the weather was much nicer this year). The course was lined with people eager to cheer on the runners, the marines were lined up to offer high-fives, and my body started to curse me out right around mile 4. But, I was determined to finish the race without walking and I did just that. It wasn’t fast and I am sure it wasn’t pretty. Slow and steady is how I win (a.k.a. finish) the race.
So now I am wondering if I might actually register for the 10K next year? Or maybe my calling is just to adopt orphan race bibs?
Wall Pollution?
When people travel, they collect all sorts of things. Some people collect magnets, some people collect shot glasses. Some people like postcards and some people like snow globes. Personally, I am not a fan of knickknacks. Clutter is my enemy. But I still like to have a keepsake of my travels, so instead of tchotchkes, I collect some form of art from my travel destinations. It could be a photograph that I have taken myself, or it might be a professional photo that I bought at a street market. It could be a watercolor painting that I bought from a starving artist, or it might be a print that I bought in a trendy shop. Regardless of the origination or style, the art will remind me of my trip and it will make me smile.
The problem with these keepsakes is that I have traveled to many places and, therefore have a lot of framed memories. Unfortunately, I don’t have a gallery in which to display all of this art. What I do have however (thanks to my very handy husband), is a gorgeous basement bar and an idea for an “around the world” theme. What better place to showcase all these pictures? So then, what’s the problem you ask? The problem is that my handy husband does not approve of my wish to hang ALL of my keepsakes. He thinks I am “polluting” the walls. In all fairness, I have to say that I can at least understand where he is coming from on this one. I mentioned earlier that clutter is my enemy. To me, clutter consists of things on horizontal surfaces and if it is there, it will literally drive me crazy. This type of clutter doesn’t give my husband anxiety the same way it does for me. However, vertical clutter seems to affect him the same way horizontal clutter affects me. He really doesn’t approve of my cluttering up the walls with all of these travel photos…but they make me happy…so it’s happening. In my defense, I don’t clutter all of the walls in our home. I think it is safe to say that our walls are moderately decorated, with the exception of our office where both of us have cluttered the walls with our various degrees, awards, plaques, etc. So what, if we have one more room with “polluted” walls. It beats a room filled with snow globes, right?
Natural Selection Fails
Last month I posted about our trip to Colorado Springs and the terrifying drive to the top of Pikes Peak. Between the hairpin turns and the lack of guardrails, I was both literally and figuratively on edge for the entire trip. The drive back down the mountain was just as scary as we could see plenty of evidence of numerous traffic accidents. The curves that actually did have guardrails were incredibly banged up and the roads were lined with their fair share of rubbery tire tracks. As it turns out, there are a lot of idiots out there that actually race down the mountain! A friend of mine shared an online article with me that included a video of a car racing down the mountain and losing control around one of the corners without a guardrail. The car flips about a dozen times and is shredded to pieces, and somehow the occupants of the car that are clearly too dumb to breed, survived! I would be lying if I said I wasn’t at least a little bit disappointed that they survived, but I am so grateful that I was not on the mountain at the same time as these morons! Click here to see the video.
Plan B (ok maybe Plan C)
After having to cancel my trip to Cozumel, I went back to the drawing board to find a replacement destination. I found a fabulous cruise to Bermuda that sounded perfect for me, but the dates didn’t work for Heather. Rob was interested in taking another trip with me this summer, so he looked into the possibility of getting leave approved. But, as it turns out, he also had a schedule conflict with the dates of this cruise.
Rob has family in Colorado and they have extended the invite on numerous occasions for us to head west to visit. I have never been to Colorado before, but I have always heard such amazing stories about how beautiful it is, so it seemed like this might be a good time to check it out. Rob’s family graciously accepted to host us and I was able to book our plane tickets for FREE (thank you Southwest reward points!).
I am not sure exactly what we will do/see while we are there, but hopefully we can come up with a good plan in the next couple of weeks. If you have any suggestions, please feel free to share them.
Floating above Woodstock
For Valentine’s Day in 2011, Rob bought me a gift certificate for a hot air balloon ride which was something neither of us had ever done before. We scheduled the flight for late last summer, maybe early fall, I can’t quite remember. We were scheduled for a sunrise flight, which meant we had to meet the pilot at 5:40 a.m. in Woodstock, Va, which is very far from home. To make things easier, we spent the night before at Tom’s house in Front Royal to shorten the morning commute. The next morning, we met the pilot and then headed to a recreational park to get things set up. It was really foggy that morning, but our pilot was hopeful that the fog would clear up in time for our flight.
Rob helped get the balloon ready for flight.
About 20 minutes later we were ready to go up. It was just 3 of us in the basket; me, Rob and our pilot, Don.
We got up above the tree line and that is when Don realized that the fog was not going anywhere and we were going to have to ground the balloon. We were only up in the air for about 2 minutes and we obviously didn’t get to see much due to all of the fog. We were going to have to reschedule the flight and try another time.
Fast forward about a year and we were ready to try this again. We were scheduled for another sunrise flight which meant another very early morning. Once again, Tom was kind enough to host us at his house. Still, we had to wake up before the crack of dawn, 4:30 to be exact. We then headed to meet our pilot (still Don), once again at 5:40. We went to the same recreational park to begin the setup. It was a bit foggy, but nowhere near as bad as the first go-around. (Notice the difference between the picture below and the same shot from last year.)
There were probably cows there last year too, but we definitely couldn’t see them!
We went through the same process for setting up the balloon. Rob was a good trooper and helped out with the setup again. I would have loved to help but, somebody had to be the photographer!
Once the balloon was set up, it was time to try this again. Rob and I joined Don in the basket and away we went.
We got up above the tree line and once again we were surrounded by fog!
Don quickly told us that we might not be able to fly due to the fog. Rob and I looked at each other thinking, “you have got to be kidding me!” Don assured us that this almost never happens. He told us that it has been about a year since the last time he has had to ground because of fog. Rob chuckled and reminded Don that we had been in this same exact position about a year ago and we were grounded due to fog. That seemed to refresh Don’s memory and he said he remembered us and thought that we might have been the patrons that were the last to get grounded! We couldn’t believe our luck. What are the chances? The thought of waking up that early and driving all this way for a third time sounded awful to me. I think I might have been ready to scrap the whole idea and hope for a refund. But before we knew it, the fog was starting to clear on one side giving Don a safe path to travel.
There were two other balloons going up that morning, but we were the first to get up in the air. So we got to watch them from above.
Even though it was a bit foggy, we still really enjoyed the view. We had the Massanutten & Blue Ridge Mountains on one side and then the Allegheny Mountains on the other side.
The highest we flew was about 1,000 feet and the fastest we went was about 10 mph. I didn’t think that animals below would really pay much notice to us floating above them, but dogs ran around their yards and barked at us and several herds of cattle ran for cover! We flew over some people that were relaxing on their deck and we waved back and forth. Our flight lasted about 45 minutes and then we found a safe place to land, which just so happened to be someone’s front yard. As soon as we landed, we swapped out of the basket with another couple that were scheduled to fly after us.
After watching them lift off, we got in the chase vehicle and basically followed the balloon on the ground. The partner in the chase vehicle needs to be there to assist when the balloon lands. She also sent off several test balloons to let Don know which way the winds were moving so that he could find a safe place to land.
We just happened to be standing by the location that one of the other two balloons was about to land, so Rob went over to assist them with their landing.
Meanwhile, Don missed his initial landing zone. He was hoping to land on the other side of those trees, but he overshot it, so the crew had to rush to the other side to assist him with the land.
It was a precarious situation and required Don to throw a tow rope down so that people could help guide the balloon in the right direction so that he wouldn’t crash into this person’s house! I am so glad this is not how our landing went!
Thankfully, it all worked out and they landed safely. Nobody was injured and nothing was damaged. I don’t believe anyone was home, but there was one very pissed off Chihuahua that clearly did not approve of this landing location. They guided the balloon further away from the house and then it was time to pack everything up.
All in all, it was a very cool experience!
Screw You American Airlines!
This past February, Heather and I went on a relaxing beach vacation to the Riviera Maya in Mexico. We got a great deal on a really nice all-inclusive resort and it was pure heaven. We decided that we should definitely make this an annual thing and travel somewhere every February. February just happens to be a good time for us to take vacation at work and it is definitely a great time to get out of the cold weather and head to a tropical beach!
A few months after we got back from Mexico we decided that we couldn’t wait a full year to do this again. Our birthdays are in September (22nd if you want to send me a gift!) and we figured that was a good enough reason to take a vacation. We found a great deal on an all-inclusive resort in Cozumel and we booked it months in advance.
We have steadily been getting more and more excited for our upcoming trip and then out of nowhere I get notified that American Airlines is reducing their flights to Cozumel and our flights were among the ones that got cancelled. Ain’t that some bull$*#@!
Our options were: 1. Change our travel dates to correspond with the new (limited) dates that American Airlines has service to/from Cozumel. 2. Change our travel location and book a trip elsewhere, keeping the same travel dates. 3. Get a full refund.
Option# 1 wasn’t possible for us because our vacation dates are not flexible. Option# 2 would have cost us several hundred dollars more because now that it is fairly close to our travel date, the prices have gone way up (so much for us planning so far in advance!). So, we settled on Option# 3. My vacation leave is still on the books, so I am hoping that I might be able to find some kind of alternative. If not, I think I might go to WalMart and buy one of those plastic kiddie pools and then pay someone to serve me cocktails (with little umbrellas in them) in my backyard.
Hot Air Balloon Ride
Yesterday Rob and I did a hot air balloon ride in Woodstock, VA. Stay tuned for pictures!
Wish List
While I love to travel, I do have to do so on a budget. I find really amazing deals that allow me to travel at an affordable rate. But, if money were not a factor, these would be my top 10 travel destinations (in no particular order):
1. New Zealand
2. Greece
3. Sicily
4. Thailand
5. African Safari
6. Russia
7. China
8. Australia
9. Iceland
10. India
I am quite certain that I will get to all of these places eventually. But the stellar deal would have to coincide with the availability of vacation leave. Until then, I will continue taking advantage of the other travel opportunities that await me.
Where In The World Is Dayna... 