Guess who got in a few outside miles today? I am a very happy camper. I didn't know an aide was coming and she called a little too late to try running outside in the heat (chalk that one up to a lesson learned!) so I hopped on my bike for a few. It was wonderful! I have started over again this week. Last week was full of mess-ups and failures. Even though I didn't do anything super  bad I just didn't watch my diet too much. I'm still trying to get the little I did do out of my system. The bp has been up a bit - but not "high." And the ankles stay swollen. I'm eating melons to help get rid of the excess fluid I decided to collect. lol So this week I decided to ramp my training back up. I am starting a streak  and plan to run or walk at least a mile each day. Today it will be a walk I am sure. I am feeling so much better and now I must be careful to not overdo it. So I will go forward with great caution. And I'm still winning! Today I seriously e...

For several weeks I had been driving by this wilderness area . It's only a couple of miles from my apartment and I've been wanting to explore. Finally, Thursday was an off day (supposed to be a rest day) from running and for cross training I figured I would ride my bike up there to see about the trail. It turns out to be almost exactly 2.5 miles up. That means I get a solid 5 miles of biking in! That's a plus. The internet said the trail was one mile. I thought maybe I would ride it to check it out and then come back and run it at a later date. I passed a runner who helped me know where some tricky spots were as far as following the right trail. Then he told me it was more like 1.5 miles around. I rode it first, then decided I had time to run it once just to see if I liked it...I loved it!! So I went back Friday and ran it 3 times! While I was exploring I thought about how different the terrain was. But it didn't matter if I was riding there are on the supposedly sm...