travels, races, and other musings

We had to wake up extra early for our day trip to the highlands. We had booked a tour with Rabbie’s to the west highlands to see some lochs and castles. We got up, ate breakfast and took a bus to the central bus station to meet the tour.  We drove for about two hours and our first stop was Loch Lomond (and of course I had the song going through my head all morning). We spent a little time there at the loch and in the tiny town next to it, Luss. We got some coffees from a little cafe and I picked up some shortbread to eat later.  From there we stopped by a viewpoint called “Rest and Be Thankful” to take in the beautiful view and snap some photos then continued on to Inveraray where we had about an hour and half for lunch and shopping. There was the option to go over to Invararay Castle, but we didn’t feel like it was enough time so we just walked around the town and did a little shopping after lunch.  We left there and set out again making a stop at Kilchurn Castle, which ...

We had a leisurely morning so we could sleep in and have some rest. Emmaline and I had reserved a time at 11 AM to make Harris Tweed handbags at Islander UK. This was something she was really excited to do and I decided to join in. Roger did not make a handbag so he stayed back at the hotel and arranged to meet up with us later. We took the bus and first made a stop at the Ba Ba Sheep store to see the sheep (and some Highland cow) merchandise. She got a little keyring to hang on her bag.  The bag making was actually really fun. You pick a base then a top and straps and they show you how to put it all together while giving you information about Harris Tweet, tartans and Scottish Isles. The guy who led the class was super funny and we had a lot of fun. And at the end we had cute bags. Classes book out so if you're ever going to Edinburgh, you do have to book in advance. They have multiple locations throughout the city so if one location is booked up, which happened to us, try another...

 May 27 and 28 - travel to Edinburgh  We didn’t have the smoothest travel to Europe. When originally booking our tickets, we had multiple options to get to Edinburgh and one of those was the direct flight from Austin to Heathrow that runs every day. However, Heathrow is not super fun so we decided to book Austin to Philadelphia and then Philadelphia to Edinburgh. We had a pretty lengthy connection in Philadelphia so I wasn’t too concerned. We got to the airport around 10:30 AM for our 12:15 PM flight and while waiting for our flight, got a notification that it was delayed until 2 PM and the new time would put us in past the departure time for our flight to Edinburgh. So I got in the insane line at the gate and while waiting I called American. The phone agent left us on the same (delayed) flight to Philadelphia and then rebooked us on a flight from Philadelphia to Heathrow and then connecting to Edinburgh. Great. Exactly what we tried to avoid, but there weren’t really any othe...

Welcome! In my life I have taken many journeys and I have many more to come! On this blog you'll find a repository of all my trip reports from various vacations as well as race reports from a range of different running, triathlon and open water swim races, my cancer journey, my fitness journey, and other musings and thoughts as I navigate this journey of life! This post contains an index (and links to) all the travel and race reports on this blog. For other topics, you can search or click a tag from any entry to see all entries tagged with that topic. Enjoy and happy travels!

 I was determined to hit the gym on our last day on the ship. I got up at 6:50 and made my way to the gym, which is smaller than I’d like. I had checked it out on the first day and noted that there weren’t any Peloton bikes, but then when I walked in the door, there were two bikes! I could have sworn they weren’t there on embarkation day. Maybe they were still getting them sorted or maybe I just didn't see them. Both were occupied, but I knew the person on one of them and she said she was just finishing her cool down so I warmed up by practicing a little BODYCOMBAT while I waited.  As I finished my practice, a guy came over and said, “Are you a BODYCOMBAT instructor?” This was a first! I said that I was and he said he taught BODYPUMP and I told him I did too! We chatted for a few minutes and then it was my turn on the Peloton and I found a 45 min ride with Christine that looked good and knocked out a solid ride.  I got back to the room and had some of the room service bre...