Monday, February 11, 2008

The Endless Halls at Glasier Canyon

We headed up to the Wisconsin Dells Friday afternoon. The kids have reached the age that they ask - "Are we there yet?" Gracie was the first to ask, 10 minutes from the house. Then Zak took over asking every 10 minutes for the next hour. We stopped for a potty break at the Belvidere oasis, that put a damper on the question until we were 20 minutes from the hotel.

Check-in for our room was a mess. The computers went down which caused a back up in the lobby. Luckly the kids didn't mind. We watched people sledding to Hannah Montana music for 30 minutes while Scott waited for our room key. Finally we got to the room, barely unpacked and headed for the pools. We swam til 7:30 and got back to the room, ate some vegi sandwhiches and watched Spiderman 3.

I planned on being up and running by 7 a.m. Scott was teasing me because our room was 2 doors down from the workout room. He said I must have called and requested it. :) That's funny cause I absolutely hate running on a treadmill. I have read other bloggers and they refer to it as the "dredmill". Well, didn't get out there til 7:30. Got on and it took me about 5 minutes to figure out what I needed to do to program it. The machine wouldn't go any faster than 1 m.p.h. So got off it and moved to the next one. At least I knew what to do this time. Realized that I could only program the time for 30 minutes. UGH! Ok, just start already. Finally 15 minutes later I was moving. And knocking my fists on those goofy handrails. I told myself I was going to run outside this year but with all the snow and not really knowing where I was going I decided to suck it up and run indoors. The half hour dragged. Even with my music and the TV on. The exercise room filled up and people were actually waiting to get on this ridiculous thing. So after 30 minutes I got off. Went back to the room to put my water away and decided to run the halls. Heck, kids were running up and down the halls until 11:30 p.m., I didn't think me running at 8:15 would hurt anyone.

I was off. The halls were endless at this place. I would guess a good 1/4 mile long on some floors. The wing we were staying in had 5 floors. I passed alot of doors that smelled like bacon was cooking on the other side and some that had garbage bags full of beer bottles. Huh? Ok, I don't get that. A couple beers good, bags of empty bottles while your kids are swimming? Keep running. I was waiting for someone to come out and complain. Or security to see me on the hall cameras and ask me to stop. But that didn't happen. I would come across some little ones, waiting in the hall for mom and dad to go down to a pool with them. Some of them would start running with me. We would go a couple of doors and then I would turn them around to go back to their door. They would be laughing and giggling. I would actually see some of them again on my way back up the hall and they would race me again. It helped the time pass quickly. Other than those children I was surprised at how empty the hallways stayed while I ran. There was the occasional bottle neck but for the most part it was clear sailing. Ran an hour and a half total.

We swam the rest of the day. Running under buckets of freezing cold water and then leaping over enormous waves. Zak gave me a scare in the lazy river of all places. He slipped off the tube but wouldn't let it go, keeping his head under water with the rest of his body flailing. Scott grabbed him and he choked up some water, he was fine. We were off to something a little less threatening. We were busy all day just being a kid. At 5:30 we were back in the room, ate dinner and the kids were sleeping by 6:00. Sammy came up with us. After the kids fell asleep, Scott took Sam to the arcade. They were back by 8:30. The kids woke up when they came in so we ended up watch Ratioulle. Me and Scott missed most of it. I'm getting old, I can't stay up past 10 anymore.

Got up Sunday morning and ran the halls while Scott took the kids to the indoor play area and arcade. I was surprised by all the stuff they came back with. It was time to go. The drive home was a slow one because of the ice and drifting snow. Saw the capitol building when we passed Madison. Can't believe Ironman Wisconsin is over. This September I'll be up here as a spectator cheering my tri-mates on. Well, onto different things. Pekin IL. Hmmm, wonder what the trails of Pekin look like. I'll find out in about 11 weeks. :)

1 comment:

RunBubbaRun said...

Your so dedicated, not sure if I ever ran through the halls to get the miles in..

Pekin, it will be different, just think of it like running through the halls with trees and rocks throw in there.