As most of you know, over this past weekend, I participated in the Susan G. Komen 3-day 60 mile walk. I thought I would share some of the experience with you. This post will be more about where we went on the walk and what is was like. I will do another post later in the week about the emotional side of the walk (deep, I know!).
To start, I will tell you that I did not stay in a tent on a blowup mattress at the camp that is set up for the walkers. No way, not this girl! I stayed at Camp Hilton with my fellow walkers, my mom and aunt. My aunt did the walk last year. She slept in a tent the first night. She slept in a nice, cozy comfy, warm bed at a hotel the next night. Yup, that is what happened this year as well. We weren't the only ones either! There were several participating hotels that hosted many, many, many walkers.
Each day we walked around 20 miles and along the route, every couple of miles, there were rest stops which had porta-pottys (yuck), water, gatorade, snacks, and a medical tent. The routes were packed with lots and lots of people cheering us on. Some even brought their dogs, which, of course, I stopped and said hi to each and every one! The San Diego police were dressed in pink shirts, rode their bicycles, and kept us entertained with music and dances at lunch. There were decorated "titty-taxis", which gave rides to the injured or tired, but also cheered us on with crazy outfits and music. There were vendors along the way who sold buttons to decorate our lanyards/identification and other breast cancer related items. I purchased several buttons, including "1-Year Survivor," "One Tough Chick," "Yes, they're Fake...the Real Ones tried to Kill Me." and one for my husband "Boob Guy!" There were even people who were giving shots of alcoholic drinks! They weren't full-size shots, but more like half a shot. Totally unexpected, but fun! One lady told me that she had been to 5 other races in different cities and had never seen soo much alcohol on the route before. I knew I chose San Diego for a reason!
My mom and aunt are professional walkers (not really, but they both trained for this), so they were truckin' along the route, which was fine by me because I walk better by myself (very anti-social of me!). It gave me time to think about everything that has happened over the past year and a half and what the future holds (deep thoughts, for sure!). They had to pull over to the side of the road and wait for me...a lot! The amount of training I did was walking a mile a day, every day, and going to the gym a couple of times a week. This was 20 miles every day for three days. Yeah, I wasn't prepared.
The
first day we were up at 5:30 am to catch the bus to the starting line. It was dark. It was cold. And I needed coffee. I knew it was going to be a long hard road ahead of us, but, there was an amazing electric vibe among all the women on the bus that made it hard not to be excited.
We walked in to the Del Mar Fairgrounds, found coffee, and got our lanyards which provided ample space to fill up with buttons and stickers given to us and purchased throughout the walk. After a few tears during the opening ceremony, we were off!
We went through Del Mar where shop owners gave us mini-cupcakes ("suck it up cupcake" was a favorite saying during the walk, so cupcakes were appropriate!), stickers, water, and lots of cheering. We went down by the ocean and walked through a light rain which totally messed up my hair and I had worked very hard on my hair that morning (actually, I spent a total of one minute on it!). We ventured up a massive hill in Torrey Pines that just about did us all in! I actually turned around and walked backwards for a bit because my legs were screaming in pain! We stopped for lunch (Panera provided it all three days), and then the rest of the day is a blur! My feet were aching. My knees were hurting. And my ankles were weak. But, I wanted to finish the day and the 20 miles. Good thing there were people handing out shots - vodka with pink lemonade! We barely made it over the finish line the first day! We headed straight for the bus back to Camp Hilton!
Our
second day was horrible. We were up at 5:45 am to get coffee at the hotel (the stuff at camp didn't have enough caffeine) and barely had the energy to climb the stairs to get on the bus. I can honestly say that I don't remember most of it because I was in soo much pain that I think I just blocked it all out! I know we walked by Sea World, and through some really beautiful neighborhoods, and down by the ocean, but that is about all I can remember. No joke. I made my first stop at the medical tent during lunch. I had to have a couple of blisters fixed up in order to continue on the journey. A guy next to me in the medical tent had to hold my hand while he got his blisters popped and fixed because he was in soo much pain. Day two sucked. Big time. We had been told that day two was the hardest to push through, and it was. Nothing a nice glass of wine couldn't fix back at Camp Hilton!
Day three was very hard, but soo worth it! It was a beautiful day and even though we were up at 5:45 again, I had actually gotten some sleep the night before as compared to the previous nights (my mom talks in her sleep and my aunt snores a bit) and I was pumped! I made a stop at the medical tent to get my blisters bandaged so that I could attempt to walk the final day. I started out strong and then slowly fell behind. My mom and aunt had to wait for me a couple of times, I felt bad, but I just couldn't push myself to go any faster. There was one final hill that seemed to go straight up. I pulled my bg girl panties up, put my head down and pushed my way up the hill. Ok, a mimosa shot, an oj-vodka shot, and a vodka-pink lemonade shot might have helped a bit, but I did turn down the full-size Miller Light! I have standards, you know! After lunch, we marched on through some colorful neighborhoods with one final push to the finish line at Petco Park. There were people lined up along the side of the street cheering us on. I did a little dance as we walked over the finish line! We stood in line (forever) to take our picture in front of the 60 miles walked banner and then flopped down on the nice, soft grassy knoll to take a well deserved, although short, rest before the closing ceremony.
All I will say about the closing ceremony is that it was emotional...very, very emotional. I will save that for my next post later this week, so stay tuned!
