Despite having cancelled most of our spring/summer vacations we opted to keep this in tact and visit my brother and his wife in Vancouver, WA for the week leading up to the 4th of July.
Read moreOur first visit to Portland
Lost Dutchman State Park
It’s neat how a scheduled departure can make you more appreciative of the things you’re going to miss when you leave. In this case, it’s camping at Lost Dutchman State Park with our great friends Sarah and Colin!
Expressing individuality in private. #MidQuarantineCrisis
It’s easily been 2 decades since I colored my hair last. I remember my dad saying, ” Sure, you can dye your hair if you want to but rebelling by imitating a stereotype isn’t really being unique is it?” In my teens I definitely looked like a few stereotypes and quite often “rebelled” by following a path someone had already laid before me such as attempting to be unique by dying my hair with my friends. ^_^
Read moreCOVID19 Pandemic impact on life.
Like most of the people we know, we have been blessed to only have a couple noteworthy points of impact during this pandemic (so far). The primary impact has really been social. Not being able to hang out in groups has changed our routine greatly. The second highest impact has been the availability of groceries. We’ve been blessed to not have been impacted financially by this.
Read moreBiking Saguaro National Park
Biking the Saguaro National Park was beautiful! This is a bike ride (or drive) that I would recommend to anyone in the area. It’s beautiful and full of the famous Saguaro. Coming in at 8 miles with only 500 feet of elevation gain, biking the Cactus Forest loop through the Saguaro National Park is super casual. Towing Maxine and stopping to take a bunch of pictures took us an hour. You share the road with cars but we found everyone to be super respectful and slow. Everyone is there to slowly cruise through the beautiful park.
Read more2020 New Years Resolutions
Time to schedule some betterment! In 2020 I am setting a resolution to…
Not drink alcohol
Since I quit smoking in 2019 I figured it would be advantageous for my health not drink in 2020. This is pretty big because I easily drank beer five days a week in 2019.
Run over 1,020 Kilometers
I managed to run over 1,250 kilometers in 2019 and that took quite an effort that I want to keep up! Follow me on MapMyFitness.
Read at least 10 books
I wasn’t counting the number of books I read in 2019 but I don’t think I read 10. I tend to listen to audio books when I jog and I’m sure I listened to more than 10 but I’m not going to count my audible consumption as reading. ^_^ Follow my progress on GoodReads
Merry Christmas
This Christmas was perfect…
Santa Barbara to Dana Point Family Bicycle Tour
Z, Maxine and I just rode or bikes from Santa Barbara to Dana point and we loved it! We camped a couple nights, stayed in a couple hotels and visited at least 10 playgrounds along the way. Please enjoy our montage video which is mostly Maxine enjoying herself during our stops. ^_^
SWIMMING!
It was four years ago today that I was swimming in a pool in Littleton, CO with my favorite kids!
Four years ago Z and I had the opportunity to live with my brother Matt, his wife Crystal and their super awesome kids. It was a blast! We spent almost every evening at the pool!
If it wasn’t for this beautiful summer, I may not have had the chance to spend nearly every evening at the pool with Maxine now! She’s hardly 2 but loves hanging out in the pool just as much as my nieces and nephew did four years ago!
Jogging in Scottsdale
I definitely consider myself as a jogger. I’ve logged a few jogs on MapMyFitness from everywhere I’ve lived and many places I’ve visited since 2012. I’ve lived in Scottsdale since late 2017 so I’ve logged quite a few jogs here. The ridiculous heat aside, I really enjoy it. Scottsdale is an urban environment so I can’t compare it to running mountain trails in Colorado or wooded rail trails in Minnesota and Missouri but it’s really nice. It’s especially awesome in the winter when the rest of the world is frozen. ^_^
Summer is HOT!
This is painfully obvious if you live here. It’s darn hot in the summer time so if you’re going to run during the day you learn a bunch of things.
- Cover up as much as possible.
- Jog shorter distances.
- Run slower.
- Stay hydrated.
- Monitor your heart rate.
If you’re going to run under the hot sun, be sure to cover up. There is some sweet clothing tech out there that actually helps. I really like the ArmCoolers by RecoFit. They work pretty darn well to cover your arms AND keep them cooler then if they were bare. With the UV index so darn high, I even wear a visor to cover my face. Fortunately my sister-in-law got me an awesome monogrammed sweat visor! hehehe.
Up to 105 degrees, I’ll still jog. If it’s nearing 100 then I’ll intentionally keep my pace really slow so I can keep my heart rate down. For me, if it’s near or over 100 degrees then I have a hard time getting my heart rate to drop after i pick it up too high so my goal is to keep it down as low as possible by waddling along with a slow jog. I can casually cruise along doing 8:30min miles if it’s 88 degrees or below so if it’s 95 and above I’ll slog along around 10:15min/mile. The hotter it is, the slower I go.
Staying hydrated can be annoying especially when you’re used to running an hour or an hour and a half with no hydration. During the winter it’s easy to put down a liter of water 30 minutes before a run and leave the hydration at home but if I’m going to run for more than 30 minutes in the heat of the day then I bring water. I can easily consume 1.5 litres and hour. I prefer to bring an iced beverage (mostly ice + some water at first) and let it melt en route. On occasion I’ll mix in some powdered Gatorade but I don’t do that often because the sweat from ridiculous heat lets go more water then anything, for me
Become a Morning Runner
Most of us tend to start jogging in the wee hours of the morning even if we aren’t built for it. Despite the fact that I don’t appreciate getting out of bed before the sun does, one of the best parts of jogging in the morning are the sunrises. It’s definitely something to appreciate when you have to be up before the sun comes up to enjoy the jog.
Another awesome perk of running in the morning is that the morning crowd in Scottsdale is just super nice. Everyone waves, everyone says hi. There’s a few folks out there that are dead to the world but the vast majority of the morning walkers, joggers and bikers are really polite.
The Infrastructure is great
For being an urban environment I feel like the running and biking infrastructure in Scottsdale is amazing. I live in a pretty ideal location next to Chaparral park but I only have to cross two small streets before I’m on a nearly endless network of multi-use paths. It’s especially awesome for biking but that’s another post.
The parks and recreation maintenance staff in Scottsdale really take care of everything they offer. The parks and trails are clean, the water fountains always work, the grass is nice and everything is pretty well lit when its supposed to be.
