So Friday night, Quinn worked super late (til 11:30!), so we didn’t get such an early start on Saturday. We’d planned on meeting up with Sarah and Matt at the Aquarium by 10 - 10:30, but we ended up getting together right around lunch time, so we all headed across the street to P. F. Changs for some tasty lettuce wraps and other yummy things.
After we ate, we headed back over to the aquarium and had a great, though CROWDED time seeing all the fish. I really liked the octopus, and the dolphin show was neat too. They have such personality; I always feel a little sad for them, cooped up in a tiny tank, with no real room to roam. I hope they’re happy, though I wouldn’t be surprised if they could use a little Xanax from time to time. We finished off our Aquarium visit with a trip to the top floor, and the rain forest exhibit. It was really cool to see the sloth, and BIG pink perching birds way up in the trees. Couldn’t see the iguana in the corner though - bummer. Henry spotted a HUGE brown toad (or frog?) in a little nook on the stair landing, and we passed on its location to the people walking behind us. It made me wonder how many other creatures we missed because they were hiding so well. ☺
After that, we drove back to Sarah and Matt’s house for supper and hanging out. We stopped at Costco and got some sushi, Stacey’s, hummus, and other odds and ends. We tucked the kids in at 8pm, and then watched True Grit, which surprised me by being a very good movie. It didn’t hurt that Jeff Bridges was in it - I always like him. ☺ After the movie (which didn’t wrap up til nearly 10pm... half an hour after my self-imposed bedtime), we went to bed downstairs on the futon.
Morning came early... the alarm went off at 4am sharp. Ugh! We got up, tiptoed upstairs, and hopped in the van for the trip north to Skirmish, PA. The drive was actually very nice, and I even got a little 30-45 minute nap. We followed the instructions to avoid traffic, and whether it was because of that, or just because it was SO early, we didn’t have a bit of trouble on the way in. We DID have to pay a *ton* of tolls, though. After we paid our $10 parking fee, we came to rest in our spot in the bumpy grassy field. Our timing was awesome, because the Sorbers were only 3 cars ahead of us, so we got to hang out starting early! We got our stuff all sorted out, and hopped on the school bus shuttle over to the Dash site. It sure was funny to ride in a school bus again after such a long absence... the seats sure seemed a LOT bigger when I was a kid. :D
We got ourselves all signed in and checked our bags. It was a very chilly, very misty morning, so I decided to wear my new Warrior Dash shirt for the race. Plus, since I already had one at home, I didn’t mind so much if the new one got dirty (and isn’t the Warrior Dash about getting dirty, anyway??) Quinn kept trying to get in touch with his friend Jodi, from high school. She’d seen one of his posts about doing the race, and as it turned out, she and her hubby not only live in Harrisburg, but they had both signed up for the wave after ours! We never did get a hold of her before the race, but afterwards, Quinn went to the finish line to watch, and he actually saw Jodi as she was charging into the mud pit! So I got to meet a friend of Quinn’s from Indonesia after all. :D How crazy that they hadn’t seen each other in 20+ years, and ran into each other at the Warrior Dash! :D
But about the race itself... it was a gorgeous course, through very leafy fern-y woods. It was beautiful, with lots of twists and turns. The whole thing is within a paintball arena, and they ran us through some of the paintball scenes, including a medieval castle and a mock town, with buildings and a church, etc. :D The obstacles were fun too, for the most part. My favorites were the cargo net and the vertical wall. The vertical wall was actually very challenging at first, but once I realized I needed to get my body as vertical as possible, and not support my weight horizontally, it got way easier. I bet it was 15’ tall. What fun!!
All in all, we had an excellent time, chilly start or no. Quinn ran on ahead like last time, and the rest of us stayed together as a pack. What a blast!
Afterwards we noshed on our turkey legs, and enjoyed our complimentary beers (Quinn found an extra timing chip, so he got TWO free beers - whoo!!) They had live music, and the first band was AWFUL. (I suppose it’s probably tough to book a *good* band at 10am on a Sunday though) We finally caught the school bus shuttle back to the parking lot, and then started the drive back to Sarah & Matt’s. Quinn got overcome by sleepiness, so I drove most of the way back to Sarah and Matt’s, while he took a much-needed catnap. Once we got there, it was time for a gloriously scrubby shower! I still couldn’t get all the mud off my legs, but the rest of me got pretty clean. For supper, Matt got out their sushi-making goodies. It was SO cool to watch him assemble the rolls, and then just reach over and nosh on them!!
We left their house after supper, and pointed the van south once more. Since he’d had a nap earlier, Quinn was fine to drive, and by then, I was getting pretty tired. We got home by about 8:30pm, which was nearly what we’d been shooting for. The boys had a big carnival at school Monday morning, and I didn’t want them to be exhausted for it.
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