New Orleans Bound

With Tristan in the Garden District during the first part of the marathon. The course was really beautiful (particularly the first half). The second half definitely went through some sections that Katrina had devastated. I find it is good to see these areas to be reminded about what a great life I have and to really appreciate all that I have.

Doing a pull up on the course. I really stink at pull ups and in fact for a few days after the marathon I was wondering why my arms/shoulders hurt!

Trying to dull the pain from the pull up. And pre-emtively trying to deal with the pain of my beads (which I earned by asking for..not exposing my sports bra!) By the end I had about 15 beads and made a signficant amount of noise. Each step, all the beads thumped my chest and actually lead to a small bruise which took a week or two to go away. Clearly I have not learned my lesson because this year I intend to see how many beads I can score.

With my friends Anne and Meg. We met about mile 15 and jogged about 8 miles together. They were really good company and I do sporadically keep in touch. Sadly neither Anne nor Meg are coming to New Orleans (even though Southwest had fares for about $65)

Enjoying a beignet after the race. Tristan snapped a bunch of pictures during this eating session. I ended up with tons of sugar all over myself. But it was SOOOO good!!! I can almost taste a beignet now. I can barely wait.

I am getting excited about another trip. This weekend I will be flying to New Orleans for the Mardi Gras Marathon. For this marathon vacation I am paying for my flight, but Southwest is really almost forcing me to go with a round trip flight costing ~$120 with fee's! And I am saving a bit more money by traveling with my friend/co-worker Qian.

Last Memorial Day weekend, Qian and I traveled to the Vermont City Marathon at Burlington VT. Our vacation was sucessful so now we are going to a different locale. I think we will have a great time sightseeing, eating and doing lots of activities in New Orleans. We arrive Saturday and are at New Orleans until Wednesday early morning. So far the weather is predicted to be in the mid-60's our entire stay which should be very nice.

I have run Mardi Gras Marathon last year and had a GREAT time. Tristan and I were there from Saturday until Tuesday morning. We saw many sights and ate a considerable amount. But when we left we had lots of activities we wanted to do but ran out of time. And we had lots of food we wanted to eat, but ran out of stomach space! This year hopefully I can be more sucessful.

During this trip we are planning to go to the garden district, go on a paddle boat, go to Mardi Gras World and go to the Zoo and of course we will eat lots of New Orlean style food (a head to head comparison of Beignets at Cafe DuMonde and Cafe Beignet are on my list of my "must eats").