Just Plodding Along

Life in Colorado is going pretty well. We have settled in our apartment and slowly learning our way around. I have found a running group to join called the Sunrise Striders. They are ridiculously fast (as in their warm-up pace is faster than my race pace), they regularly win age groups and races outright and all look like they belong on the cover of Runner's World. All of this would be really, really annoying if they weren't so nice, and warm, and welcoming, and encouraging and happy to share advice about the area. I really enjoy running with them in various places around the Springs and am sure if I can stick with them I will eventually be a better runner.  I have also been swimming with a master's swim team which meets four times a week. They are also nice and easy going. There are the serious lanes full of sleek, seal like people and then there are the lanes of people just trying to get the workout done. I am in a lane just trying not to drown. Luckily, I am natural...

After spending the night in Port Angeles we drove the few hours to Tacoma to meet D's best friend for lunch. He was an awesome tour guide of beer based Tacoma touring. If you like craft beer Washington is the state for you. If you like craft beer and specialty hot dogs then The Red Hot is where it is at.  The week we were in Tacoma we sampled lots of local brews and hit up some of the waterfront restaurants.  We went up to Seattle for the day to meet some friends for dinner but arrived at lunch time specifically to go to Piroshky, Piroshky. Russian pastries at their finest.  We wandered through the market sampling fruit, looking at art and taking in the sights. After we had seen all there was to see we wandered through downtown Seattle towards the Space Needle. Since it was super crowded and a pretty penny we were content to stare up. After wandering the streets for a few hours we headed back towards the marke...

Good thing we waited for our new rain jackets to arrive from REI before starting this trip because in Olympic National Park they were in heavy rotation. So. Much. Rain. Of course all that moisture makes everything beautiful with fairy tale type forests and beautiful flowers. It started to rain on our way to Kalaloch beach were we camped (someone wanted to see the tide pools, that someone is me) and continued to rain for the next three days. Rain makes camping.......um more difficult. Car camping or backpacking becomes an exercise in trying to stay dry and clean. I think I mentioned this before but a reoccurring theme on this trip was our being lucky. When we got to the campground it was looking pretty full but we found one spot facing the ocean that was open. Talking to the rangers they mentioned that the spot had been reserved but it was a no show. Lucky for us! When you fly by the seat of your pants and don't make reservations for anything you have to be flexible but for the mo...

(We are back in Colorado  after cutting our trip short and some exciting stuff is going on with that but I am so behind on blogging about our travels that we are just gonna pretend that we are still adventuring. The good news is I can use a computer now, though that is no guarantee the quality will be any better.....) After we dropped our cute little nugget of a lost dog off with his peeps we hit up Portland for some fun. We headed straight for a farmers market. There is a farmers market in Portland everyday you just gotta find it. It would be so hard not to spend all your money at them if you lived there. Everything looks amazing and delicious.  We wandered around tasting samples and handing our money over for cherries and grabbed some pizza from a food truck for lunch. We headed over to our airbnb accommodations when we were done. We had never used airbnb before and the idea of renting a room in someone's house seemed odd to me but it was actually super aw...