to visit Renee, my college roommate, at this lovely house she rented
Lovely outside, but reminded all of us of the setting for The Ice Storm.I hadn't been to Falmouth before (is this the lower or the upper cape? I can never keep that straight), so this was a new adventure. Falmouth has apparently just finished its "From Sea to Shining Sea" bike path, which runs from North Falmouth down to Woods Hole. I think it's about 10 miles, but it's kind of hard to find decent info on it.
I didn't have the kid's camera, so couldn't take any photos. But it's a gorgeous path.We were staying in a cul-de-sac in North Falmouth. My only criteria was that I get my training in. I everything carefully planned out, thanks to this handy site, with my training happening early mornings or in the evening, so as not to interfere with some serious daytime downtime. Thus:
Wednesday morning: group bike ride
Wednesday evening: track workout
Thursday morning: 1-mile ocean swim
Friday night, my last night: the Falmouth Track Club Friday Five mile race (Highly recommended by Anne, of Run DMZ (that always sounds like the name of a rap group) fame.
And, instead of that, this is what happened:
Wednesday morning: Hmm. That bike ride? Advertised as "a big boy/big girl ride...There are spots where the pace gets over 30 mph." Um, nevermind! At least I'll do the evening track workout.
Instead I went for a calmer bike ride, and then we headed to the beach:
Where I did venture into the ocean once and swam for about 1/2 hour...pretty much going backwards the whole time. And then I slept. Waking up at oh, 4:45. The track workout was at 5:15.
Oops.
Well, nevermind about track! Sheesh, it's a vacation!
I was soooo glad I brought the bike. Every morning I woke early and rode about 3 miles to the start of the bike path, and from there to the local coffee shop, Coffee Obsession, where I blissfully lingered over a latte and bagel and The Boston Globe, catching up on the latest installment in Gates-gate (heh), which totally dominated the news, and the conversation.
Thursday: Early-morning open-water swim. I spent most of Wednesday night worried sick about this, but got up and drove to the appointed spot by 6:15 a.m., for a 6:30 start. Hmm. Place was pretty empty. No gathering of any swimmers. At 6:35 I figured I had dodged a bullet and hightailed it outta there before anyone could show up. Got back to base and jumped on my trusty bike, back to the coffee shop. Ahhhhhhh.
We spent the rest of Thursday biking to Woods Hole, deciding at the last minute to jump on the ferry to Martha's Vineyard, reconsidered since we were throwing a grown-up (sort of) dinner party that evening, meaning it might be nice to, you know, actually prepare food, tooling around Woods Hole (very cool place), and riding home. I took myself off for a massage, raced back, made a grown-up dinner of shrimp scampi
and posed on the extremely hip 1970's spiral staircase
My last night there, I ventured into charming downtown Falmouth, and met the Falmouth Track Club for the Friday night Five mile race.
Me: Five miles, 53:00, fourth from last. Which, ladies and germs, is a PR for moi. Ooh-rah.
Later that night, I gingerly learned how to operate a gas grill, wherein I overcooked the tuna (sigh)
And also looked at the night sky.
I miss New England.
Saturday, for Part Three of the Road Trip, I drove to the Big Apple, to spectate at the New York City triathlon. My friend Sarah's brother, Mark, was competing.
And all I have to say about that was: It. Was. Awesome.
Well, and this: Mark (and his abs) placed 12th/349, and 36th overall.
Watch it all here.
