"Training Camp"

Last weekend we did a little "training camp" in Osoyoos. I called it training camp because that is literally what we were doing; camping and training. I had friday afternoon off, and we have been itching to get our bikes on the road and get some sunshine so we decided to head to osoyoos for the weekend. It is only 4 hours away, so after work I went for a quick swim, we loaded up the car, picked up our freshly tuned bikes and hit the road. It is amazing, as soon as you drive half an hour out of revelstoke there is NO snow, where as we STILL have 2 feet on our front lawn. We were determined to get some vietnamese for dinner in Kelowna, but unfortuneately the GPS on my phone led us astray, so after some driving around we settled on some thai food, which was alright. By the time we finally got to Osoyoos it was 8pm and dark, and yet it was still plus 10 outside... ahh warmth. Since the office was closed we had to find the security guard to check in, and he was mighty concerned that we were sleeping in a tent, asking if we had a heater to keep warm. We just laughed considering the himelayan hotel (our tent) is meant for the base camp of everest and can hold 4 feet of snow on it, and our sleeping bags are good to -12. However, I responded with a "I think we'll be fine," and he left us to set up.

The next morning it was a little chilly, so we let it warm up until we hit the road on our bikes. We had some breakfast, explored the campground, and just relaxed. We finally hit the road around 10:30, and I was aiming for a 3 hour ride. Coming right out of osoyoos you hit the start of Richters pass, which is a 10km hill and is part of the ironman canada course. My only goal was to make it up without stopping, and 30 minutes later WE MADE IT! woot! Although it was pretty uneventful because it's not like there are signs, banners, or fireworks congradulating you on making it to the top. Infact, when we got to the top we weren't even sure if that was really the top. Anyways, Ben looked down at the hill ahead of us and realized that if he biked down it he would have to bike back up, and since he had been sick all week he didn't want to push it so instead he turned around and headed back to the campground. While I continued on, down the backside of the rogers pass, and turned around at 1.5 hours, then I realized how smart ben was. Biking up, then down the backside, then up the backside, and then back down rogers pass is brutal. But, on my way back up I just focused on getting to the top since I knew there was a pretty awesome 10 km downhill back into town. Needless to say when I got back to the campground I was pretty tired and my butt was VERY sore. After a hot shower, some lunch, and a nap I started feeling better and we decided to check out osoyoos. We treated ourselves to some pizze and a bottle of wine, and a walk along the beach before packing it in for the night.

We woke up on sunday to what looked like a threat of rain so we packed up all our camping stuff before we went for our run. We managed an hour run, and although my legs weren't sore they were definitely tired, no fuel in them. So the run was a struggle. When we got back to the campground we showered, ate some breakfast, and hit the road.

We had SUCH a great time that we decided that we needed to do another "training camp" soon. So we booked the campground again for the May long weekend, and also for the oliver half ironman in June. It was clean, was right on the lake, had great showers, and even had a club house with a pool and tv if you wanted to get in from outside.

On the way home we had some errands to do, so we were prepared for a long drive. However, we were not prepared for the 10hours it took. It turns out a there was a huge accident on the highway the day before and it had comprimised a bridge. Meaning, they didn't know it the bridge would hold up to cars being on it. We sat for hours, until we finally decided to hop on a side road and ended up budging hundreds of cars, but we were stil not even close to the bridge. Eventually they started letting a few cars across at a time, and we managed to sneak across, getting home after 9pm. We were tired, hungry and grumpy. We ordered takeout from the nearby pub, ate and headed to bed.

Training this week has been going good. On monday I felt like I was getting sick so i took the day off and relaxed. Which was a good idea because i felt much better the next day, and managed to bike tuesday and swim yesterday. Ben managed to get to the gym mon and tue but took yesterday off. So a swim is due today, and a run tomorrow and we've made it through the week. We're not doing double workouts right now. I think if we are still healthy after 2 more weeks of doing one workout a day, then we'll ramp it back up to 2 workouts.

We just found out that my brothers and my nephew jack are coming to visit tomorrow. So we are VERY excited! We haven't seen jack since christmas, and he has changed so much. It should be a great weekend. We're hoping to squeeze in a couple workouts in the morning before everyone gets up. Then next weekend we're headed to fernie to visit ben's mom. Very excited about that too, should be a great lond weekend. We also will hopefuly have a look at couple of places and get started on this wedding planning thing!

have a great day!
Jen