First things first, if you haven’t entered Dine, Dash, and Deadlift’s 1 Year Celebration Giveaway, go do that ASAP! Now…on to today’s post….
I was scheduled to run a 25K trail race this past Sunday, but I didn’t make it to the start line. I spent last week in San Francisco for the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) Annual Meeting – recap post coming soon – but left on Friday night so that I could make it back for my 5th trail race of the year. Delayed flights and then a cancelled connection in D.C. resulted in me not being able to get home until Sunday afternoon, well after the end of the race. Major bummer.
On the plus side, I was able to turn this set back in to 2 trips when only 1 was scheduled. I hadn’t been to the nation’s capital since I was in grade school so it was great to sightsee as an adult.
Triple-fisting at the White House (hello Obama’s!) with coffee, running water bottle, and the best ginger ale ever.
Aka – how a tired, ginger-loving runner sightsees!
Seriously, I recommend picking up some of this stuff! (http://www.freshgingerale.com/)
Besides the White House I swung by the Washington, Jefferson, and Lincoln monuments (not pictured). Then I felt the need for a picture with the Wyoming pillar of the WW2 Memorial. Have to rep where I went to college as much as possible!
Then I spent some time with Mason. He’s pretty cool!
I also swung through the Air and Space Museum of the Smithsonian and had dinner at this great place called Commissary Cafe, which I HIGHLY recommend!
Knowing I would be missing my race on Sunday, I decided to map out a 15-16 mile route to run in the district before heading to the airport. It’s amazing all the sights you can see in 16 miles! Hit up the monuments again. Then I ran over to Arlington National Cemetery. I was thinking I might run a lap on the roads surrounding it, but the giant signs telling me it was closed until 8am (despite the gates being wide open at 7am), followed closely by this “No Jogging” sign made me do a U-turn.
From there I proceeded to run along what I think was the Rocking Creek Path (DCers, does that sound correct?) and over to Teddy Roosevelt Island, which I was delighted to find was NOT paved. After that, the legs and I found some more trail miles on the Potomac Heritage Trail. DC, you are kind of awesome!!
To round out the run I headed over to Georgetown. Such a cute little area. If I find myself in DC in the future with $ to burn, I am taking my purse and going over there for some shopping! Then I made a beeline back to the hotel so I could pack up and catch my plane. All in all, I am sad I missed the race but I am happy with how the weekend turned out!
When was the last time something bad ended up turning in to a good thing for you? Are you as devoted to your Alma Mater (or even the state it is in as a whole) as I am?
Dine, dash, & deadlift 