New Adventures

Call me trailblazer—since I have been focusing on a fun, healthy lifestyle instead of just weight loss, I have been on the move and everywhere. It started in April, right after a week of intense pain from kidney stones.  I wanted to get out of the house after I had to have the stone surgically removed. I had been cooped up inside all week and it was getting to me, mentally and emotionally.  C obliged and we walked for about a mile until my pain-ridden body decided it was time to go back.

The next month, C found a meet-up group that was for walkers since I had complained that I wanted to meet new friends and go places. I was starting to get an adventurer bug, but I wasn’t ready to set out by myself in an area I wasn’t used to anymore.  So, C and I went to Great Falls with the group and had the most amazing time. We followed the canal trail from the information center to Difficult Run where there was another waterfall. Then, we looped around to head back to the Great Falls gorge where the Potomac was swollen and the waterfalls sprayed observers who climbed boulders to get a better view. It was a five mile moderate to strenuous hike and I was hooked.

Throughout the rest of the summer, C and I would go for long walks that ranged from four to six miles around Arlington and Alexandria. Several times, we walked a small portion of the Mt. Vernon trail that travels from Mt. Vernon Estate to Washington, DC. We also traveled the trail from Shirlington to Potomac Yards in Alexandria on the Four Mile Run Trail a few times, once when we were walking to get something for breakfast and coffee. Our longest walk, until recently, was six miles from the Old Town Area of Alexandria, across the Woodrow-Wilson Bridge, into the National Harbor in Maryland, and back.

During this time, I was amazed at how my body was adapting. I started as a commuter who rarely walked, besides going to the car and back, to someone who rejoiced in walking miles in one day. C and I had started to track how long, fast, and far we walk in a single outing and I am always excited to see that we met a personal record either in speed or distance. Usually on Tuesdays, the walk is mainly for mental therapy, my speed slows down so that I can take pictures, smell flowers, and watch fauna act normally. Sometimes, I listen to music as a background, but normally, I talk with C.

So, perhaps this will be the beginning of an adventure-seeking blog. I can share my experiences, take pictures, tell which trail I followed, what I ate, etc. Maybe, I can find myself a niche in the paleo/primal blogs by discovering appropriate paleo munchables for day-hikes or where to go around the Mid-Atlantic area for  awesome adventures. I wonder how things will pan out.