We're off like a herd of Canadian Turtles!

This was a very interesting weekend! Saturday morning, Ryan and I got on the ferry bright and early to head towards Victoria, BC. I love being able to do weekend trips to another country. So, it's just Canada, but I still needed to bust out the passport! The ferry was packed with people, mostly runners, heading to Victoria for the Royal Victoria Marathon. The name of the marathon itself just sounds cool! That's why we were heading there too...my first full marathon!! We spent most of the ferry ride consulting the iPhones to keep updated on the Auburn football game. About halfway there though we went into international roaming and it would have been really expensive to keep using it. After dropping off our bags though, we headed straight to a sports bar (the Sticky Wickett...hahaha only in Canada) to watch the rest of the very disappointing game.

A few hours later Liz (a good friend from college), her fiance, and two of her co-workers showed up to join us! The whole reason for this trip was because Liz and I decided back on our girls weekend on the beach that we should do a marathon together, so this was the one that we chose to do. We spent the rest of the afternoon/evening walking around the town, checking out the sights, then loaded up on carbs at a fabulous little italian place. It was getting pretty chilly out, and we ended up getting a table outside so we wouldn't have to wait too long, so the restaurant started handing out snuggies to anyone who wanted them outside. They also had heated toilet seats which I was thoroughly amused by. After dinner we called it a night to rest up for the big runs in the morning. Liz, Andrew, and I were running the full marathon, and Liz's co-workers were running the half marathon. I was planning on waking up around 7am to get ready for the race, but at about 5am I woke up and got really nervous about what I was about to do, and couldn't get anymore sleep. It was an early morning for sure! I think I got a little more energy when I got around all the other people ready to run. The hotel we were staying at (The Fairmont Empress, which was super posh) was close to everything, so we just had to walk around the corner to get to the starting line. After a little warm up run and downing some energy bars and gummies, we were ready to go! Before the race started they had someone sing the canadian national anthem which startled me a little at first as I had forgotten that we were in a different country! It made me giggle a little. Finally we were off...and 4 hours and 45 minutes later we were done! It was perfect weather for a run and the scenery was awesome. When we started, there was a blind lady right in front of us that was running with a guide. How awesome is that to blindly run a marathon?!? In order to entertain myself the whole time, I had downloaded 'The Lost Symbol' to listen to. I think it worked pretty well and kept me at a steady pace the whole time. It all went really well until about the last 6 miles that my legs decided they didn't really want to go any further. So after a painful and slow 6 miles, we were finally done. YAY!

Ryan met me at the finish line and helped me wobble back to the hotel. I've been really bad about cooling down after long runs which usually makes me sick, so this time I just stretched out and took of my shoes to let my tootsies breath and we went for a little walk around town to keep my muscles moving. The rest of the day we all kind of did our own thing to recover from the runs. Lots of resting, eating, and hot tubbing. It felt soooo good and relaxing!

After a good nights sleep Sunday night, we all 6 piled into Liz and Andrew's rental car and headed to the  Butchart Gardens (one of the big attractions around Victoria). It was huge and had a ton of different flowers and plants. Definitely worth a visit. We were all super sore from the day before, so it was a little embarrassing when we had to let significantly older people pass us because we were going to slow down the stairs.

Ryan and I headed back on the ferry Monday night, while the rest of the group stayed on one more night. Unfortunately Ryan had to go into work when we got back late that night and pretty much pulled an all nighter to get some stuff done for Tuesday. What an end to a vacation. I had taken Tuesday off as well, so I had a nice relaxing day to spend in Seattle before heading home. It was an awesome weekend, and it's nice to know that all my running lately finally paid off. We'll see if I get enough energy to try that again anytime soon!