Sydney - the Prelude

Okay, well sooooo much happened last weekend I'm going to have to divide it into three posts, so bear with me.

Sydney - the Prelude

Sydney - the Main Event

Sydney - the Encore

So the Prelude ...

Friday afternoon three very excited runners made their way to Avalon Airport, thanks to Alison driving.  And it was a sign.  In our uncanny way amongst our closest friends in our Athletics Group that we turn up wearing the same colours - we've even done it for the plane flight - all wearing stripes!  It was a sign!

The flight to Sydney and we got in before the scheduled 7pm and decided on a taxi rather than working out the train system.  I think the poor driver thought we were checking up on him, we all had our mobile phones out and he kept explaining the one way streets that he really *was* on his way to our accommodation.  Except he took a wrong turn so turned the meter off and made his way back to where he was meant to be going.  So there's a tip people, you won't get ripped off in a taxi if they think you're GPS checking up on them!  

We were delighted by our accommodation at Hyde Park Inn.   I can well and truly recommend it - in terms of location (right opposite Hyde Park),  location to the train stations (within a very easy walk to both Museum Station round the corner and Town Hall Station a couple of blocks away), and the accommodation itself was exactly like the picture and the slight problem we had with the fridge not working they actually replaced the fridge for us.   The accommodation also gave us free continental breakfast, free newspapers, free wifi and there was free parking (if we had a car, which we didn't).

Alison found a nice pizza/pasta place around the corner called Macchiato, and we were ready for a feed so headed down there post haste.   Ended up with a flirty waiter who asked me for my ID, hahahaha.  Well it was a bit dim in there, the girls quickly got out their phones and used the torches for the menu!  Got to love their ingenuity.  You can take the girls out of the country but ...

Up and ready on Saturday morning to explore we headed to the Expo to pick up our race pack and drop off our bags to the bag drop - warm clothing and anything we needed after the race would be taken to the end for us tomorrow.   I tried on a number of the Asics event tops but they are all such super slim fitting and didn't suit me at all.  I came away with a nice cotton t-shirt with the event on it, which I actually liked a lot better and I have been wearing it ad nauseum this week with jeans.  I also bought some mandarin GU which has been my favourite flavour of late, tastes like Fanta!  What's not to love about that.   The GU man (well what do you call him, he seemed to be a GU aficionado) was showing us the new GU wafers about to come out, a pre-run snack to have to keep the hunger pangs away. 

So right, event bag dropped we headed back to the hotel to take our all important race bibs back so we didn't cart them all over the city and decided we should do a trial run to the event start for tomorrow, being that it would involve a train trip.  Nothing like being prepared.  We had bought our Opal card and timed our walk to the Town Hall Station and then the train trip to Milsons Point.   

Silly me, I don't know what I was thinking, we were on the train and I looked out and it was my first glance at the Harbour, and then the penny dropped.  WE WERE ON THE BRIDGE!  But were we?  I'm looking out the window for the bridge, is it possible we were on the bridge or another bridge?  And I'm asking all these questions out loud in the train to anyone who would listen to me ... "Are we on the bridge, noooo we're not on the bridge, are we? OH MY GOD WE'RE ON THE BRIDGE!!"  

Apologies to my travelling companions for being such a dork!

So we we were glad to have done this trial run to Milsons Point so we knew exactly what we were to do the next day and could work backwards so we knew what time to leave the accommodation.  So we had a little wander down Milsons Point, I'd never been over there, it was great seeing the Bridge and the Opera House from this unique angle.   And as you can see it was a magnificent day.  We were just relishing being in short sleeves after leaving such a cold Victoria.

So as the tourists we were, we thought a ferry trip would be in order so decided on a ferry to Darling Harbour.  Inside or outside?  Doh, was there any question.  We enjoyed the scenery as we sailed.

We really didn't want to walk too far, so took a very easy stroll to the Queen Vic Building to our meet up with the other ladies from the 12WBT Runners Connect group.  Although on the way Alison and I were accosted by "Giovanni" from some beauty salon.

First rule of thumb ... DON'T MAKE EYE CONTACT !!

Too late, he had us in the store and sat down and started applying gunk to our eyes.  He doesn't just take any woman off the street you know, he only takes those he thinks he can help!  What a line!  Need to work on your flattering skills Giovanni.  Once the $300 bottle of diamond dusted encrusted gunk was presented to us, Alison and I hightailed it out of there.  Oh Lordy Lord.

Lunch at the Jet Bar at QVB, yay, getting to meet the Sydney contingent from our runners group was surreal.  It was actually hard to take pictures in the cafe as it was dull inside so by the time the cameras came out a number of the ladies had left.  But not before I got these shots.  I also got to meet my RDU buddy Tamra in the bright pink shirt, we cat and mouse all the time on Run Downunder.

And after lunch we got to see some of the delicacies at Zumbo.  I didn't even trust myself with one macaron, it all looked too amazing.

We utilised the kitchenette in our room that night and Kellie, Alison and I had pasta with a plain tomato napoli topping, parmesan cheese and a bread roll for dinner and it was perfect.  I didn't even do a 'Flat Carol' like I usually do, this was as good as it got.  Red on red, that means fast right?

Alarm set for stupid o'clock 4am wake up as we would want to leave the accommodation by 5am the next day, we said our good nights and I'll honestly say I had one of the best nights sleep pre-race than I've had before.   More to come in the next post.  Stay tuned.

Catching up

I've been a bit slack on the ol' blog hey.  But that means I've been busy.  So here's a catch up in 100 words or less! ha, since when have you known me to only use a hundred words!!

We've become a Garmin family!  Well I've had my Garmin for a while now, but Mike was fortunate to buy a second hand one and he's loving it.  Says he feels like a 'real athlete' now! ha.   For any non-runners reading this or anyone scratching their head - the Garmin is one of many ways to track your run.  It's like a little computer on your wrist.  Measures your pace and distance by way of GPS, lots of other things too like heart rate.  Then you sync it to the app and you can get all sorts of data from it including elevation that you ran, amount of steps, speed, it's wonderful for stats junkies like myself. 

Mike has been out in the studio painting.  With all the rain and cold weather we've been having, this has been his 'time out'.  It's nice a cosy in the studio too.   He's slowly getting back into it.  He studied painting in his younger years, and it's been annoying him how it's not really like riding a bike, you don't just jump back into it.  But like anything the more you practice [ train ;-) ] the better you paint [ run].  You knew I'd have to put a running analogy in there somewhere.

So the running, gearing up for Sydney.  I've been doing hills!!  Not that this Sydney run is hilly, it's a new course and is apparently flat.  But hills make you stronger.   On this particular night it was so funny.  I have this crescent that is a nice out of the way place to just go up and down ad nauseum.  I was doing 5km of hills this particular night and at one stage as I was puffing my way up, an elderly lady came out of her house and said "are you lost dear?"  

And long runs!  The thought of doing 19km around my little town here would do my head in, so on this particular Friday off I popped into Warrnambool and had a lovely scenic run along the ocean and up to the whale viewing platform.   

So much nicer on your run to see sights like this - just gorgeous.

Or this...

And as of my run yesterday there were only 8 days to go!   7 days now.  Heck by this time next week it will be all over red rover and we shall be cheering my friend Kellie in doing her first marathon.   I have the best travelling companions in Kellie and Alison for this trip.

We've been getting a fair bit of water around these parts in the last few days.  There's been some shocker floods up in Coleraine and Casterton and yes we've had rain, but now the water coming down from north is adding to it and we're flooding down here.  So much so that the Koroit to Warrnambool half marathon that was MEANT to be happening this morning and which I was volunteering at, has had to be cancelled.  The rail trail is under water in parts.  As in under REAL DEEP water!   Sad sad sad for the organisers to make this hard decision but safety first always.  There's no way you could have run it, and too late to change course and get the various permits.  Disappointing for the runners who were training to peak specifically for this weekend.  But as runners they will understand that the decision was not taken lightly.

And so to end this post on a fun note, look at these two munchkins.  How lucky we are to be their nanna and grumpy.  Their Great Uncle from Scotland sent them Celtic jerseys as a gift.  I think they're pleased.