It is always the way. You spend hours driving around the countryside seeing nice scenery and parks and wildlife, often going for long day trips to get as far a field as possible in the hope of seeing something really spectacular. You’re not often disappointed (although yesterday’s readers will know we came pretty close!).
But then, right near the end of your stay, or after you have been in a place for ages, you realise that there are some really nice places just on the doorstep. In fact, ten minutes drive away in this case (or rather twenty minutes if you allow time for my directionally challenged map reading).
Hendrick’s Park is right next to the University of Oregon but we just don’t seem to have found the time so far to go there. Despite the recommendations of a couple of people I suppose we weren’t so enthralled at the prospect of going to a small town centre park and time has just passed us by.
However, today was the day, and with the weather forecasters predicting a 20 degree high we set off in high spirits. The weather forecasters got it wrong but we weren’t complaining at the 15-16 degree temperature, and we also have to say that Hendrick’s Park lived up to the hype.
Set on top of a hill, there is forest and a whole load of trails - despite the relatively small area that the park covers, each trail was secluded from other trails by the high trees. We had quite a pleasant walk. Only one complaint though was that it was pretty hilly so perhaps I will avoid going on any running excursions there! Unfortunately I didn’t have control over the camera so no decent photos were taken!
Tuesday, 16 March 2010
Monday, 15 March 2010
Orienteering
We liked the look of Detroit Lake State Park, so thought that the two hour drive taking us 100 miles north east of Eugene would be worthwhile. After all the park had miles of walking trails, a wildlife viewing area, two play areas (for Andrea not me!) and even two giftshops. It looked great. We charged up our batteries with an Ihop lunch of omelette and pancakes (we didn’t finish it) and then hit the road. We didn’t think of checking whether it would be open or not and unfortunately when we got there it was closed for restoration works!! Gutting.
Determined not to waste a two hour drive and intent on getting out of the car for at least half an hour, so that we could loosen up, we set about finding another park to explore. We had a map of where some of the other state parks in the area were and headed for the nearest one only to find it was closed! We’ve not seen a park closed since being in the states and then we see two in the space of 30min! All was not lost though as we soon found a park that was open. It wasn’t as spectacular looking as Detroit lakes, but we still enjoyed a walk there. Andrea went snap happy with the camera again and took a lot of bad photos (as well as a few good ones of which I’ve posted a few below).
Perhaps Andrea's best shot of the day
North Santium State Park
Tomorrow is supposed to be a scorcher. Well not quite, but it is meant to hit 20C. Who said March was still pretty much winter!!
Determined not to waste a two hour drive and intent on getting out of the car for at least half an hour, so that we could loosen up, we set about finding another park to explore. We had a map of where some of the other state parks in the area were and headed for the nearest one only to find it was closed! We’ve not seen a park closed since being in the states and then we see two in the space of 30min! All was not lost though as we soon found a park that was open. It wasn’t as spectacular looking as Detroit lakes, but we still enjoyed a walk there. Andrea went snap happy with the camera again and took a lot of bad photos (as well as a few good ones of which I’ve posted a few below).
Tomorrow is supposed to be a scorcher. Well not quite, but it is meant to hit 20C. Who said March was still pretty much winter!!
Sunday, 14 March 2010
The Return of the Blog
This has to be a near record - over three days have past and no blogs have been written. The reason? After four and a half months of metronome like daily blogging we finally ran out of steam, we blogged ourselves out, ran out of things to say.
Well, not exactly.
It was more of a case of our fun being severely hindered by factors beyond our control. That is to say the weather. When one is on such a strict, low budget, most our activities have to take the form of the outdoor and free variety. These activities, as you can imagine, are less appealing when it is truly lashing it down with rain and your only item resembling a waterproof lets the rain in within about five minutes.
So as a result we’ve had to have a more indoorsy few days, and we didn’t want to loose any of our faithful readership by describing how many pages Chris read of his ‘Options, Futures and Derivatives’ book or how long I spent looking on the internet for potential hen do related activities.
The weather finally brightened up a little yesterday and so we headed down to Autzen Stadium to experience yet another new sport, women’s lacrosse. It was great to get out after a relatively dull couple of days and we enjoyed the game which was quite fast paced - despite not fully understanding the rules (again). Chris reckoned he might be quite a good lacrosse player due to his speed and fitness. However, people used to say that about me playing hockey, until they saw me play, so I’ll reserve judgement for the time being. It was a shame that my good friend, the Duck Mascot, had obviously gone on holiday for the weekend but I was still sufficiently amused by the women a few seats down from us with a Duck sounding whistle. Simple things eh!
The ducks taking a hard fought victory over Iona
We’ve also taken the opportunity to see a couple of films these last few days, especially after discovering another cinema where it is a bargain price of $1.50 per person. We both preferred ’Invictus’ to ’Up in the Air’ although neither film scored major points with us and we still await the ’wow’ factor. This weekend was also the weekend of the World Indoor Athletics Championships and the NCAA Indoor Athletics Championships, both of which were being streamed live over the internet. These both had some pretty exciting races to watch and filled our evenings quite nicely…especially when washed down with a good old glass of root beer.
The weather forecast is meant to be better this week so hopefully we’ll be able to get out and enjoy our last week and half of Eugene without catching pneumonia.
Well, not exactly.
It was more of a case of our fun being severely hindered by factors beyond our control. That is to say the weather. When one is on such a strict, low budget, most our activities have to take the form of the outdoor and free variety. These activities, as you can imagine, are less appealing when it is truly lashing it down with rain and your only item resembling a waterproof lets the rain in within about five minutes.
So as a result we’ve had to have a more indoorsy few days, and we didn’t want to loose any of our faithful readership by describing how many pages Chris read of his ‘Options, Futures and Derivatives’ book or how long I spent looking on the internet for potential hen do related activities.
The weather finally brightened up a little yesterday and so we headed down to Autzen Stadium to experience yet another new sport, women’s lacrosse. It was great to get out after a relatively dull couple of days and we enjoyed the game which was quite fast paced - despite not fully understanding the rules (again). Chris reckoned he might be quite a good lacrosse player due to his speed and fitness. However, people used to say that about me playing hockey, until they saw me play, so I’ll reserve judgement for the time being. It was a shame that my good friend, the Duck Mascot, had obviously gone on holiday for the weekend but I was still sufficiently amused by the women a few seats down from us with a Duck sounding whistle. Simple things eh!
We’ve also taken the opportunity to see a couple of films these last few days, especially after discovering another cinema where it is a bargain price of $1.50 per person. We both preferred ’Invictus’ to ’Up in the Air’ although neither film scored major points with us and we still await the ’wow’ factor. This weekend was also the weekend of the World Indoor Athletics Championships and the NCAA Indoor Athletics Championships, both of which were being streamed live over the internet. These both had some pretty exciting races to watch and filled our evenings quite nicely…especially when washed down with a good old glass of root beer.
The weather forecast is meant to be better this week so hopefully we’ll be able to get out and enjoy our last week and half of Eugene without catching pneumonia.
Thursday, 11 March 2010
Dexter Park
Another day, another state park. This time it was Dexter State Park, around a 30min drive from our apartment. The weather has turned quite a bit colder over the last day or so and neither of us have a massive amount of warm clothes, which meant that today’s walk had potential for being the shortest yet! We ended crawling down the side of the reservoir damn and found some nice paths through the forest. Andrea was on photo duty again and got some decent ones.
The reservoir at Dexter Park
What a nice rock. Definitely worth a photo Andrea ;)
Apart from that there isn’t so much to write about. After you have trained twice, done a core stability session and been shopping as well as talking to friends and family online there isn’t so much time to do much else. It is nice to be able to relax and not have any worries though. We’re still not missing our old lives of work just yet!
Apart from that there isn’t so much to write about. After you have trained twice, done a core stability session and been shopping as well as talking to friends and family online there isn’t so much time to do much else. It is nice to be able to relax and not have any worries though. We’re still not missing our old lives of work just yet!
Wednesday, 10 March 2010
Rainbow Spikes
So as the altitude question rumbles on and on (and maybe looks more unlikely), other race preparations are now in full swing as the ‘Big Four’ races that comprise my track season approaches. Actually of the four there are really only two that I’m really bothered about but it is still pretty nerve wracking all the same. Preparations are beginning to near completion as today I purchased some rainbow coloured spikes from Downtown Eugene. I am sure the big crowds will now be uber-impressed with the colour of the undersides of my feet so surely I can’t fail??!
In the evening we again took advantage of four dollar Tuesday at the cinema and went to see ‘The Last Station’. Probably the best film we have seen so far on our trip, this film told the story of Leo Tolstoy, the Russian novelist and author of ‘War and Peace’. The story followed the last few months of Tolstoy’s life and his relationships with people around him. Definitely worth the four dollars anyway although we really need to be more disciplined on the sweet front - this time we excelled by even our own standards having polished off the whole lot before the film even started. Oops a daisy.
It has to be said that yesterday was a fairly low key day with no real excitement to report. We seem to have spent quite a while trying to work out what we are going to do in the next (and final) portion of our trip. There seems like so much we want to see and do around California that we just can’t decide what to do when! With only seven weeks now until we come home and back to reality, time suddenly seems really precious, funny really when you spend all day deciding what you are going to do with it!
In the evening we again took advantage of four dollar Tuesday at the cinema and went to see ‘The Last Station’. Probably the best film we have seen so far on our trip, this film told the story of Leo Tolstoy, the Russian novelist and author of ‘War and Peace’. The story followed the last few months of Tolstoy’s life and his relationships with people around him. Definitely worth the four dollars anyway although we really need to be more disciplined on the sweet front - this time we excelled by even our own standards having polished off the whole lot before the film even started. Oops a daisy.
It has to be said that yesterday was a fairly low key day with no real excitement to report. We seem to have spent quite a while trying to work out what we are going to do in the next (and final) portion of our trip. There seems like so much we want to see and do around California that we just can’t decide what to do when! With only seven weeks now until we come home and back to reality, time suddenly seems really precious, funny really when you spend all day deciding what you are going to do with it!
Tuesday, 9 March 2010
To Altitude or not to Altitude
For the last few days we have been debating as to how we will spend the last 7 weeks of our trip. We have several things in concrete, i.e. the races that Andrea would like to do in California, but apart from those few days not much else has been planned.
As things stand we have another 16 days in Eugene before we head south to Palo Alto (just outside San Fransisco) where Andrea will do her first 5000m on the track of the season in the Stanford Invitational Track Meet. A couple of weeks later we want to be in Carlsbad, CA, a few hours south of Los Angeles, where Andrea wants to run in the Worlds Fastest 5km Road Race. We are hoping that Andrea can get into the elite race (just for the experience), but we will have to see how things go. Then a week later we will be heading back up to Walnut, CA where Andrea will likely do her second and last track 5000m of the season in the Mt Sac Relays. This is actually a four day festival of running, so we are intrigued about what goes on there. After Andrea’s second race we only have 12 days before we fly back, with the last three of those spent in Las Vegas. No doubt we’ll be partying and spending the remainder of our money. We’ll still be in bed by 9pm though so don’t worry! This means that we have around 3 weeks in California with few plans of where to stay and what to do and we also have a 7 or 8 day window after Andrea’s last race before we head to Vegas. It is in this window when we are thinking of driving to Flagstaff Arizona to do some altitude training before driving to Vegas for the end of our trip.
For those that don’t know, altitude training is a big thing in the world of distance running. The idea is that because of the reduced oxygen in the air at higher elevations the body is forced to work harder with the oxygen that is available. On returning to sea-level you are then able to utilise the higher levels of oxygen better and essentially run faster.
Some of the theories around training at altitude are that you need to be up there for longer than a week to start realising the benefits of the higher elevations, although some people are able to get great results from even just a few days. It seems to be a very individual thing. It also has the possibility of just tiring Andrea out a great deal (with the significant risk that it may even wreck the remainder of Andrea’s season - it should be noted though that the main races of Andrea‘s season are over here in the US, the ones in the UK won‘t be anywhere near the standard and will be more for fun really). It is something we need to weigh up. On one side we think going to altitude would be a good experience and if it is something we want to take advantage of in future then even going for a week would be a good experience. However, there is the real possibility that we may not get it right and Andrea may not race well when we get back to the UK. It is something we are considering and we will try to work out what our overall plans are in the next few days so that we may begin to sort out our accommodation.
So there you go. Those are our plans. We are unsure of whether to go to altitude in the middle of April and we are also not sure of how we should divide our time around California. If anyone has any ideas on either then let us know, we would be grateful for any input. Thanks…
As things stand we have another 16 days in Eugene before we head south to Palo Alto (just outside San Fransisco) where Andrea will do her first 5000m on the track of the season in the Stanford Invitational Track Meet. A couple of weeks later we want to be in Carlsbad, CA, a few hours south of Los Angeles, where Andrea wants to run in the Worlds Fastest 5km Road Race. We are hoping that Andrea can get into the elite race (just for the experience), but we will have to see how things go. Then a week later we will be heading back up to Walnut, CA where Andrea will likely do her second and last track 5000m of the season in the Mt Sac Relays. This is actually a four day festival of running, so we are intrigued about what goes on there. After Andrea’s second race we only have 12 days before we fly back, with the last three of those spent in Las Vegas. No doubt we’ll be partying and spending the remainder of our money. We’ll still be in bed by 9pm though so don’t worry! This means that we have around 3 weeks in California with few plans of where to stay and what to do and we also have a 7 or 8 day window after Andrea’s last race before we head to Vegas. It is in this window when we are thinking of driving to Flagstaff Arizona to do some altitude training before driving to Vegas for the end of our trip.
For those that don’t know, altitude training is a big thing in the world of distance running. The idea is that because of the reduced oxygen in the air at higher elevations the body is forced to work harder with the oxygen that is available. On returning to sea-level you are then able to utilise the higher levels of oxygen better and essentially run faster.
Some of the theories around training at altitude are that you need to be up there for longer than a week to start realising the benefits of the higher elevations, although some people are able to get great results from even just a few days. It seems to be a very individual thing. It also has the possibility of just tiring Andrea out a great deal (with the significant risk that it may even wreck the remainder of Andrea’s season - it should be noted though that the main races of Andrea‘s season are over here in the US, the ones in the UK won‘t be anywhere near the standard and will be more for fun really). It is something we need to weigh up. On one side we think going to altitude would be a good experience and if it is something we want to take advantage of in future then even going for a week would be a good experience. However, there is the real possibility that we may not get it right and Andrea may not race well when we get back to the UK. It is something we are considering and we will try to work out what our overall plans are in the next few days so that we may begin to sort out our accommodation.
So there you go. Those are our plans. We are unsure of whether to go to altitude in the middle of April and we are also not sure of how we should divide our time around California. If anyone has any ideas on either then let us know, we would be grateful for any input. Thanks…
Monday, 8 March 2010
Another sunny day in Eugene...
There was a slight change to normal proceedings this week as Session Saturday became session Sunday, which meant that there wasn’t a whole lot of time to get anywhere between the two big training sessions I had to do. However, all was not lost as a quick visit to the Ducks website told us that there was a new sport we could nip and watch down at MacArthur stadium - women’s stunts and gymnastics.
Although we were unable to stay for the whole competition due to the impending track session, it was pretty interesting to watch the team compete for points in a type of people-pyramid building competition. It looked pretty risky too as people were thrown up into the air and caught. Chris asked me if I would like to do something like that - I wasn’t so keen…it would probably resemble a plank of wood being thrown skywards and crashing down in an awkward heap. Either that or my legs would snap off or something equally painful.
Portland State's Stunts and Gymnastics team doing a pyramid routine
We were both worn out in the evening after all the training so we decided to have a quiet one and take the opportunity to watch the Oscars for the first time. This was probably the biggest waste of four hours since we have been on the trip, and we were glad when it finally finished. It’s something to tick off the list but we certainly won’t be tuning in for future ceremonies.
Although we were unable to stay for the whole competition due to the impending track session, it was pretty interesting to watch the team compete for points in a type of people-pyramid building competition. It looked pretty risky too as people were thrown up into the air and caught. Chris asked me if I would like to do something like that - I wasn’t so keen…it would probably resemble a plank of wood being thrown skywards and crashing down in an awkward heap. Either that or my legs would snap off or something equally painful.
Portland State's Stunts and Gymnastics team doing a pyramid routine
We were both worn out in the evening after all the training so we decided to have a quiet one and take the opportunity to watch the Oscars for the first time. This was probably the biggest waste of four hours since we have been on the trip, and we were glad when it finally finished. It’s something to tick off the list but we certainly won’t be tuning in for future ceremonies.
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