Best Trip Ever

I went to Miami in the spring and it was the worst trip ever because of the traffic, the tolls, the lodging, the parking and the new ballpark's location.  It was also the best trip ever.  (Below:  Fireworks explode over the Marlins Stadium on my second night.  The Marlins beat the Mets!)

When I couldn't check into my hotel upon my early afternoon arrival downtown from the airport, because the hotel didn't have parking, valet service or even a traffic circle in front and I didn't want to pay the $6 minimum street meter amount (for two hours parking, there's no such thing as a 15 minute errand in downtown Miami), I needed something to do for a few hours before I went to the Florida Marlins new baseball park to see the game that evening.  That was the purpose of my trip, to see a major league baseball game at my 44th different stadium, leaving only one extant stadium to go (new Yankees Stadium).  (Below:  Inside the gaudy new Marlins stadium.  The splashy colors inside belie the desolation of the neighborhoods outside.)

I headed for The River Bar & Seafood Restaurant and enjoyed happy hour there.  For a $19 tab I had several draft beers, three oysters on the half shell served with condiments on a bed of ice, crackers, interesting conversations and was offered several different opinions on the best way to drive to the ballpark from there.  Check out the picture of me enjoying myself, below.

Going to the ballpark, I found free parking by driving a couple of blocks into the surrounding neighborhood four blocks east of the stadium.  Despite the mean look of the streets I walked down to get to the park, free is good and my car was undisturbed when I got back to it around 11 pm.  (Below:  The fare outside the ball park was just as tasty as the fare inside, and a lot cheaper too.  The first night I bought a Cuban Sandwich and a beer for $16 inside; the second night I bought a jumbo loaded hot dog and a soda for $4 outside.)

Inside the ballpark I tried indigenous fare by ordering a Cuban Sandwhich for $7.  Although it wasn't exactly authentic in that it didn't have toasted bread for its outside, it took awhile to prepare (which was a good thing), its various cold cuts inside it were plentiful and tasty and I enjoyed it.  The accompanying $9 Heineken draft in a plastic cup not so much, or at all, asw it was flat warm and not filled to the top.  (Below:  Remember the Charlie Brown refrain that there's nothing better than a hot dog with a baseball game behind it?  There's nothing better than a Cuban Sandwhich with a Marlins game behind it, not even the tepid flat beer in a plastic cup for $9 could spoil that.)

I drove to Key West the next day to fulfill a longstanding goal of going to the southern most tip of the continental U.S.  The long drive down the Keys was fun (I sailed around the Keys for a week in 2009), I enjoyed walking around Key West, and I saw a double rainbow going into the sea on the way back.  (Below:  Every bit of the U.S. is in front of me in this picture.)

And I had a wonderful adventure my second night at the ballpark.  First I purchased my dinner from a vendor outside after the game and I got a fat and delicious kosher half-smoke for $3 which I ate while enjoying the postgame fireworks show.  Then I stopped in a Spanish bar and pool hall for a beer four blocks from the stadium as I walked bacfk to get my car which was two blocks further.  The bar maids were beautiful, no one spoke English, none of the tough looking young men playing pool looked at me even once and I well imagined that I was the first baseball patron they had seen in there since the stadium opened a year earlier.  But I eventually made the bar maid understand that I wanted a Corona ("Una servica, por favor."  "Que?"  "Como se dice Corona in Espanol?"  "Que?").  She finally brought me a cold Corona in a bottle for $3 and I enjoyed sucking it down while I took in the ambience of the Spanish pool hall.  When I was done I figured it was time to go and I left, but happily.  No one followed me as I returned to my car and I drove to the hotel one last time, happy about my excellent trip to Miami.  (Below:  I flew home the next morning and the plane went right over my running venues along the Potomac River as we landed.  That's Rosslyn in Arlington on the right.)

The Good Ol' Days

After a week of being closed due to record snowfalls, federal offices are open on a limited schedule. Three blizzards in one season has overtaxed the DC area, and for me to get to work today, I would have to walk five miles to (and presumably back again from) the nearest underground Metro Station alongside an icy snowbank in roadways that are down to two lanes, sharing the road with moving traffic because many sidewalks aren't shoveled. More snow is expected on Monday.

A year ago I was sailin' the Keys, mon.

Feelin' Groovy

What will I do next weekend with my first Saturday off since before November 8th, when the Reebok SunTrust National Half-Marathon Training Program started up? On my last Saturday off, which was on November 1st, I drove to Hershey Park, stopping in the Gettysburg outlets on the way there and back, and had a weekend full of chocolate, shopping and roller coaster rides. There was no running that weekend, confirmed slackard that I am.

That was before Obama even got elected, much less inaugurated, and that other guy was still busy driving the economy off the cliff. Since then I have directed the nineteen week half-marathon Program, and am just now finishing up directing my club’s twelve week 10K Group Training Program.

There was a trace of humidity in the air this morning as nine of us ran the actual course of next week's 10K target race in about an hour. The 10K Program started off in February when 21 people signed up, and had winnowed down to 7 runners and two coaches (thanks Kathleen!) on this last training run.

Except for the week I spent sailing the Keys in March, I have been leading a small pace group for the last 27 Saturdays. So what should I do with my free morning next Saturday? I guess I’ll probably just go running. (Right: Sailing in Florida.)

A Run on a Key

Lignum vitae wood is a dense wood heavier than water, which is used in boatmaking. Why I don't know, although Captain Jimmy told me. I forget now though. I guess it sinks, which doesn't seem like a desirable property for wood on a boat to me. (Right: I'm guessing that the reddish wood is lignum vitae.)

It's rare, but it's present on Lignumvitae Key. This 13 acre island is a state park, accessible only by boat. We put in there at the dock. Our visit was memorable for two reasons. The island had a bathroom. And I went for a run. (Left: The water from Lignumvitae Key.)

The island has a house built by the island's former owner, which now serves as a visitors center. The heavy vegetation of the island surrounds the open square that the house sits on. There is a road that runs around the island, through the brush. (Right: The wooded trail that runs around Lignumvitae Key.)

It felt good to be running down a road again after two days on a boat, even if it was a sandy trail closed in by a canopy of treetops. Also there were huge tough spiderwebs stretched across the road that I kept running into. (Left: It was awfully quiet running on Lignumvitae Key.)

Down the primary lane, I hit a T intersection against a stone wall. Turning right, I soon came to the end of the road upon a beach. The shallow blue waters of the keys beckoned me. A boat rode at anchor a quarter mile offshore. Those waters would be where we would spend that night. (Right: The visitors center.)

Backtracking, I ran past my ingress point and ran on through the forest, skirting the small island I suppose. The only sounds were my soft footfalls on the sandy trail and my breathing. This was a run I really enjoyed.

Emerging back onto the open square fourteen minutes later, after a run of about 3K I guess, I loped off to the dock, sweating. My boat was casting off! Thanks for waiting, guys! (Left: Barry and Captain Todd came by to inspect our boat.)

The guys were covering for me! Evidently the park ranger was shooing us off the island. The daily tours had been cancelled, due to the Decider's economic debacle I suppose, and the park rangers hadn't changed the website to reflect that fact yet. The park was closed. My crew members kept telling the ranger they had to wait for a guy who was "in the bathroom" (me). (Right: Snorkeling by Lignumvitae Key.)

I jumped aboard and we shoved off and sailed around to the back of the key and tied up to a mooring 400 yards off shore. Putting on our snorkel gear, we swam in to the shoreline. It was my first time in the water down there and with the flippers, mask and snorkel, the half mile swim to the shore and back came easily. (Left: Our 25 foot boat Spring Tide.)

Afterwards we rafted up with the other two boats and enjoyed an evening of socializing. Going back to our mooring before dark, we engaged in our ultimately unsuccessful quest to see the "green flash" as the sun sank into the sea. (Right: Jeffrey aboard his kayak.)

The snorkeling was nice but the run was wonderful. (Left: Sunset in the Keys.)

How to Cook Salmon

Earlier this month I spent a week sailing the Florida Keys with 14 of my college friends or their S.O.s. in three boats. Two were 32 footers and the one I was on was 25 feet. Three persons in the group knew how to sail, one captain for each boat. There were two couples and myself on my boat, which was captained by Jimmy, my freshman roommate in Sewell Hall at CU in 1970.

(Right: Sunset in the Florida Keys.) Each boat had a low-powered diesel engine that would enable the boat to go about three knots. As a point of reference, in seven days our boat used three gallons of fuel. Jimmy was the best sailor of the lot, although the other two captains, Harrie (Jimmy's older brother) and Todd weren't slouches.

(Left: Jimmy. Behind him directly to the left of his head is the "oven" I used to cook the meal I prepared.) One night it was my turn to cook. Our kitchen was a portable two-burner alcohol stove below deck and a charcoal grill bolted onto the cockpit railing.

After getting the grill going with a layer of charcoal glowing red-hot, I spread out a long piece of aluminum foil on a bench and placed six half-pound salmon fillets on it in three side-by-side rows of top-to-bottom touching salmon steaks. Then I sprinkled it all liberally with McCormick Grill Mates Lemon Pepper with Herbs seasoning. I sliced two green zucchinis and two yellow long-necked summer squash into long thin diagonal slices and laid the raw pieces over the top of the seasoned fish. Closing the foil over the top, I wrapped another long piece of foil around the enclosed package and placed it on top of the grill in the charcoal grill unit, which I then covered and closed the vents on.

(Right: The meal I prepared.) Meanwhile I boiled about 18 small red potatoes on an alcohol burner. I'm a bachelor cook so I don't bother with salads, or appetizers, or anything that is hard to clean up.

Forty minutes later I removed the tightly-closed silver package from the grill, cut the red potatoes into slices and put the pieces on five plates , sprinkled them with squirty butter from a spritzer, put salt and pepper and lemon quarters on the table, poured the red wine (I like red wine, even if it doesn't supposedly go with fish), put a fish fillet, covered with vegetable slices, on each plate and set out the fare. The fish was soft, moist and barely flaky, and the skin stayed on the aluminum sheet as I slid the fillets onto the plates. The vegetables were similarly soft and moist but not overdone.

(Above left: The crew, l-r, Jeffrey, Maddy, Shelly, moi, Jimmy. We're standing next to our boat, Spring Tide.) I cook strictly by an innate sense of timing, and appearance, although I never peeked inside the closed foil rectangle. It was one of my standard meals, although I had never cooked it in a charcoal grill before. (At home I always prepare it the same way, pouring or sprinkling anything handy over the top of the fish, and cook it at 400 degrees in the oven for twenty minutes. With so much fish in the package, and having no clue as to what temperature it was in there, I doubled the time.)

(Right: Sure I can cook. You got any fish?) The other four persons seemed to like the meal and started spreading the word throughout the fleet that I was a gourmet cook. It was actually pretty easy, and it all came together at the end. One of the other boats also cooked salmon steaks a couple of times, but they actually grilled it on the grill each time.

Back from sailing but not back yet

I'm back from sailing the Keys on Cap'n Jimbo's boat, safe & sound. What a blast--perfect weather for a week, great company, sunny, breezy days filled with adventure and strenuous activity. Some of my friends will be heartened, but shouldn't get too hopeful, that I worked on the long-neglected (since college) leg of the hidden tri athlete in me, swimming.

I took to visiting the fleet in the mornings, swimming to the other two boats and begging a cup of coffee at each one while I rested up on board for the next swimming segment. Some swims involved about half a mile. I think the great salinity of the shallow waters on the inside part of the Florida Keys helped my buoyancy, but still, when you're a quarter mile off a boat in open water with nothing closer, there's nothing to do but keep going whether you'd like to quit or not. I perfected a back-floating flutter kick to cover the distances.

Mooring at Indian Key, going ashore on the kayak beach at the Lorelei, taking the Cowpens Cut, snorkeling at Hens & Chickens Reef, dropping anchor at Cheecha Rocks, running the trails on Lignumvitae Key, holding up an ambulance while we cleared the raised bridge at Snake Creek at 3 MPH (whoops! sorry), floating off with the tide after running hard aground in the Atlantic Ocean at mean low tide off Treasure Harbor, seeing a shark (a 3-footer) while snorkeling off Shell Key, going under the high arch bridge at Channel Five, it was a spectacular week. Hail to Cap'n Jimbo, Cap'n R and Cap'n Todd for providing an eventful but safe passage for the 14 of us.

I'll post more later but I'm not back from vacation yet, as I volunteered to be bumped from my flight out of Ft. Lauderdale this afternoon. So now I am 200 feet off of I-95 at the Holiday Inn in Hollywood, FL, miles away from anything worthwhile (I can barely see the tall buildings by the shore in the far away distance) while I await a 7 am flight. I am getting a free domestic flight for my troubles; perhaps I'll use it for next year's Bucket Trip. Already there's talk afoot of hiking a 14,000 foot peak and rafting in Colorado.