Last day

Today is our last day in California. We fly back to cold Edmonton tomorrow. We have had such nice weather here. I hope Alberta gets spring soon. I need proper weather to wear my new clothes.

After our breakfast at a place called Red Apple, we continued our drive north to San Francisco. On the way, just outside of Santa Cruz proper, we stopped at a mall to do what? You guessed it, SHOP. More Victoria's Secret, a necklace and cute summer dress.

OK, I think I've shopped enough. Let's go. We continued our drive towards San Francisco, all the while stopping along the way at various beaches and points of interest. At one beach there were a bunch of sail boarders, and we stopped to watch for awhile. The next stop was a place called Half Moon Bay. What a place to call home.

We're getting close to San Francisco now, so we are diligently watching road signs to take the correct exit. There were no signs that directed us to the airport so we ended up lost somewhere, and the gas tank was almost on empty. Talk about a stressful situation ... so many roads, so much honking. What do I do? Where do I go? First thing's first...we need to find a gas station. People were very helpful and directed us to a Shell. I never thought to ask if they have air miles (smile).

Now, to find the airport. I asked the attendant at the gas station to direct us in the right direction. We were far away from the airport, but it was easy to get there, or at least I thought it was. We got on the right freeway, but the signs weren't clear to me, so we ended up in South San Francisco. I was getting a little frustrated by that point. We stopped and asked for directions again. We finally got to the car rental return area of the airport. We checked in the car and an attendant asked us if we would like a ride to a hotel. Oh, yes please! It wasn't part of their regular service, but they offered to take us anyway. The hotel was nicer than the one in Monterey and it was a lot cheaper and had better service. I guess that's what you get in a tourist town like Monterey.

We're almost home, but there was a glitch when we went through Security. I forgot to put a bottle of chocolate/red wine in my checked luggage and I had to throw it out before I went through the pearly gates AKA Security.

The day after

This is our last day in Monterey and we were very creative in packing, what with all the clothes I bought. Thanks to the Victoria's Secret tote I got free because I spent more than $75, I had an extra carry-on bag.

We picked up Beryl and Alissa at their hotel and proceeded to drive towards the 17-Mile Drive exit. The 17-Mile Drive is a beautiful scenic drive on a toll-road that twists and turns through neighbourhoods of the extremely wealthy and even the rich and famous. The mansions, no wait, palaces, were unbelievably huge and talk about location, location, location. The views were spectacular, not that I got their view first hand, but I used my imagination. This exclusive area is also home to Pebble Beach Golf Course, where we had lunch. I'd like to say we hobnobbed with the rich and famous, but I don't think we were in the right area of the neighbourhood. Rumour has it that Clint Eastwood lives in this neck of the woods. While we were driving, and when I would see an extraordinarily large palace, I would say "I wonder if this is where Clint lives". We're on a first-name basis ha ha. Then we would tell my Mom to go knock on the door and ask "Is Clint in?" She's around the same age as him, so maybe the butler/maid/cabana boy would think she is a friend of his. The worst that could happen is that they might tell her "You've got the wrong house; he lives over there".

We came to a community that had much smaller homes and Beryl said "the poppers must live here". Again, location, location, location.

When we finished our scenic drive, we went to Carmel and did some more shopping. I was surprised I only bought some socks. I didn't see anything that struck my fancy too much. I did see a nice leather belt for $790, and that didn't include the buckle. I think it must have been alligator, but still, $790. Really???

After our day of adventure, we drove Beryl and Alissa to their hotel in Monterey and we drove north towards San Francisco, but not without stopping in a place called Watsonville for the night. I paid $3 to get WIFI, but it didn't work very well. I kept getting disconnected from the Internet. So much for posting a blog that day.

You want hills? I'll give you hills!

I crossed the finish line; albeit, not quite as quickly as I had hoped. My goal was four and a half hours; but my official time is here. Click on "Overall" at the left of the screen, and my results are on page 31. You will see there are two times; net time and gun time. The gun time was when the race started. My wave started three minutes later, so the net time is my official time. It was a glorious day; the weather was perfect and the scenery was spectacular. There is only one day a year that this portion of Highway 1 is closed to traffic. I could hear the surf and the seals barking because there were no motor bikes, motor homes, or yahoos taking away from the glorious sounds of nature. I can see why this race is so popular. It is a very tough course though - only a couple of flat sections. The rest is either an uphill or downhill, and not only that, but long hills. I don't think I slept much last night. The hotel was to call and wake me up at 4 am, I set the room's alarm clock for 4 am and I set my watch alarm for 4 am. I don't know why I always worry that I'm going to sleep through all these methods of technology! Pre-race jitters I guess. After I got on the bus that took us to the race start, I felt at ease. I don't have to worry about anything anymore, other than running the race. The gun went off at 6:48 am and I was running well - right on pace - a 10 minute mile. The objective was to hold back my enthusiasm and not pass anyone so eventually I will be able to run a negative split - where the second half of the marathon is faster than the first half. The mile markers were funny, so I'm going to share some of them with you. Mile Marker 1:
11 minutes, jeez, I better speed up abit. Later I would find out that mile marker 1 wasn't quite in the correct location. Mile Marker 2:
20 minutes - spot on; just where I want to be. Mile Marker 3:
30 minutes - this is turning out to be a great day. Oh wait, it's onlys 30 minutes into the race. I had a huge smile on my face taking in all the scenery. I was getting warm, so off came my T-shirt. Ah, this is better. There were mansions right on the water front. Maan, it would be nice to live on the ocean front. Mile Marker 4 Just as the mile marker suggests, thank God for porta-potties. So far, so good; I'm still on pace - yippee. Now, if only the next four hours goes as well as the first 40 minutes, I'll be in marathon heaven. Here's a video of the piano player on the course. Not a nicer setting to hear beautiful music.
And now...the Japanese drummers:
At about mile 14, my legs were starting to get sore. The hills were too much for my legs to take. I persevered until my legs were so sore I couldn't persevere anymore. I started to do the walk-run thing and my walking eventually got to be longer, so much longer that I was hardly running anymore. This is going to be a long walk to the finish line. I was so far over my goal time of 4:30 that I really didn't care anymore. As long as I crossed the finish line before the cut-off and got the medal, any time was OK with me.


Mile marker 21 eventually came along,
and then shortly after that I saw mile marker 25 in the distance. How can that be? Did I miss 22-24 somehow? Did I fall asleep? Then I came to the Point Lobos State Reserve turn-off. Really...? Are you serious? I have to go three miles that way - an out-and-back? I thought it was too good to be true to have missed those mile markers. That walk seemed to take forever.

When I finished that portion of the run and about another half mile down the road, there was a table of fresh strawberries that was awaiting me. They were cold too.

I can see the finish line in the distance. Maan, my legs hurt. I usually have enough gas in the tank to sprint to the finish, but energy wasn't the problem that day. Sore legs was the problem. It was about 30 seconds to the six hour point and the announcer was encouraging us near-finishers to finish under that time. Every part of my lower body was sore, but I dug deep and pressed through the pain for a few seconds, just so I could cross the finish line in under six hours since the start of the race. I finished with a second or two to spare. I didn't actually start until three minutes after the start of the race because the start was divided into waves, and I was in the second wave. There were too many people to start all at once, so I actually finished a little more than three minutes before the six-hour point, but I was in the moment so I indulged the announcer.

The first thing that hurt when I crossed the finish line were my toes. Coming to a sudden stop - thank GAWD my exercising was done for the day - made my toes slam into the front of my shoes - Ouch! How much more pain can I endure today? Let's find out by walking around, trying to stretch, trying to sit down to go to the bathroom, and any other regular daily activity that will cause pain. Forget about the Runner's World Challenge...these were the challenging activities (ha ha).

Food, where's the food? I had to go into the peon's food tent because the Runner's World Challenge tent didn't have any food left. That's what happens when you're too slow. I also missed out on my massage because by the time I finished eating, they weren't accepting any more people for massages. Another flaw on the organizers part. After finishing my first Ironman with a time of 16 and a half hours, there was still a full tent of massage therapists and lots of food left. There is no better organized race than an Ironman.

When I got back to the the hotel room, I went for a hot tub and then an ice bath, in hopes of my legs getting some relief tomorrow. I felt like an old lady when I moved - very slow. I even walked backwards down the stairs.

Mom and I went for burgers at a place called t.g. Burgers. Apparently, 't.g.' stands for 'too good'. Oh, look, a store. Mom laughed as I said that. She got a kick out of watching me get excited about shopping. While we waited for our burgers, I went shopping at the boutique just beside the restaurant... I digress; back to the burgers. I agree with the analogy of 't.g.' meaning 'too good' because they were the juiciest, best tasting burgers ever. The milkshakes were also served the old fashioned way... in those metal milkshake tumblers.

After dinner I just wanted to head back to the hotel to relax, blog and go to bed. Tomorrow we go to Carmel-by-the-Sea, take a drive along 17-Mile Drive, and more shopping. Beryl and Alissa are going to join us.