I was on the road again this weekend with the kiddos to go see Grandma & Grandpa TooTall and make a visit to a local indoor water park! I managed to squeeze in a quick 6 miler before the festivities began. When I’m up at the lake, it’s mostly road running. I picked a route with a few hills since I was going short.
Then I was barely back in the house and the kids were dressed and ready for their adventure at the water park! We went to Splash Universe in Shipshewana, IN. The area is really known for its flea market and Amish shops but in order to accommodate the large number of visitors to Amish Country, the town had to build up a bit with restaurants and hotels. This is one of the “fun” hotels that has an indoor water park and since it’s about 20 minutes from the lake, we try to go once in the winter so the kids can have some fun in the water and enjoy the 80 degree temps. 
See those slides in the middle? Michael LOVED those things, probably went down them several hundred times, if not more. Grammie would stand at the top to help police the little ones from piling down on top of each other and I was at the bottom to move Michael along so he didn’t get crushed by the next one coming down. And then he would walk back to the top and do that again, and again, and again, and AGAIN.
Then this morning, I needed to go out for a longer run since I didn’t do it yesterday. I wasn’t feeling it at all. I really needed to run 12 but I could barely talk myself into leaving the house so I was pretty sure that wouldn’t happen. Then once I did get out the door, I couldn’t get my Nike+ GPS Sportwatch to link up. Apparently, it was tired too. I waited & waited & waited then basically took off running figuring that’s why I had the sensor for moments just like this. So I ran.
I made it about a mile before ducking into a seasonal campground. I expected it to be deserted and wanted to see if there were any trails remaining from when we used to snowmobile there during my childhood. We used to spend a lot of time in this location in the winter months as this was home base for a local snowmobile club that would snowmobile all over the lakes and then return to this campground to warm up in one of the buildings where they would have coffee, hot chocolate and food. However, that was when we used to get lots of snow in the winter. I can’t imagine that snowmobile club exists anymore, and I’m quite certain that most of the members of that snowmobile club are long gone like my grandparents. So today was a trip down memory lane and like all good memories, the current reality never measures up. I did find one old trail down by the lake but it was very overgrown almost to the point of being impassable. I didn’t make it far before giving up and turning back. 
After giving up on “trail” running, I just circled the roads in the campground. Half of the roads were pancake flat and the other half were very hilly. So it was a good mix and I definitely got in some nice slow miles that were challenging. I ended up with approximately 10.5 miles today but they were very slow.
So good weekend, lots of fun, a few run miles and lots of drive miles.
What did you do this weekend?
Happy Running, Amanda – TooTallFritz
TooTallFritz 
when you say slow… is that like a 9 minute slow???!??!? 😉
Hmmm….slow? I do know speed is relative to the individual and better to describe it by relative perceived effort like very easy, easy, moderate and hard or variations of it. Unless ya really know what your average pace was or by the mile splits. I really don’t know what TTF’s slow is in terms of pace. Average % of HR-max is even better! Well…doesn’t matter…she says slow….so it must have been slow for her!
Well…back to the essential question of what one did this weekend. Well, I didn’t run at all…canned my schedule 19-miler cause woke up late Friday evening with every muscle aching, some mild chills and periodic sweating, plus the incessant throbbing hamstring. Not sure what it was so decided to just stay home and tend to housework and other business, but I did do some walking for errands to stores and opted to go green, so Friday was walking 4-miles, Saturday 4-miles and Sunday 7.5 miles (in two separate trips). Doesn’t matter if you run or walk…you burn approximately the same calories. So…while I can’t run until I resolve this “bug” I can do low-intensity walking to keep active and prevent weight gain. Ya…had to cut-back on what I eat to maintain my running weight.
Kind of neat not running and not worrying about schedules and miles, and walking to the store to return and pick up DVDs from Red Box. Another movie tonight, but to bed early!