Mom's turn: Finishing what we started.

Day 11 Words can’t describe how proud I am.
Wonderful, magnificent, breathtaking, superb, amazing, astonishing, fantastic, brilliant, great, outstanding, superlative, bravura, glorious, splendid, out of this world, spectacular, incredible, awesome, awe-inspiring, excellent, terrific, fabulous, marvelous, miraculous, remarkable, startling, astounding, astonishing, beyond belief, shocking, exceptional, admirable, commendable, praiseworthy, laudable, exemplary, impressive, striking, exciting, electrifying, thrilling, exhilarating, moving, rousing, gripping, enlivening, elating…and the list goes on!

Travis completed his first marathon, the Big Sur, a 26.2 mile run along Highway 1 in Monterey, California in 5h32m19s. He got up at 3am to walk down to catch the shuttle that brought him to the beginning of the race, which started at 6:45a.

there were over 4,200 competitors at the starting line

That, in itself, is commendable – especially since the temperature was in the low 40’s!!!

Still smiling...that's amazing!

Teeny filming her Daddy coming across the finish line - was caught on camera herself!

The girls and I went to the finish line to wait for him at a much more reasonable hour! That’s where we saw him finish with a huge smile of gratification on his face. He said, “hills were brutal, but the wind was worse. I met a lot of interesting people along the way and the scenery was great!” This was punctuated by his 101 pictures that he took along the route. He saw various bands, but his favorites were the Japanese drummers encouraging him up to Hurricane Point and the piano player.

We ditched the post-race food for something much better. On one of his co-racers recommended some clam chowder from Fisherman’s Warf, so that’s where we headed. You can walk along and sample the various restaurants until you find the one that’s perfect. We found our favorite, along with some killer calamari, roasted garlic with toast, and a shrimp and crabmeat ravioli covered with creamy pesto sauce. We sat next to the window so we watched several more albatross and a few sea-lions while we ate and left no room for dessert!

We took Travis back to the hotel where he promptly passed out! At the race registration the day before we learned that the Cirque le Masque was performing that evening and participants in the marathon could get 2 for 1 priced ticket. Travis said he would treat us for cheering him on…more likely because he wanted a quiet room to recover in. So I took the girls; Teeny was excited to introduce Mao to this type of show. It wasn’t as big as a Cirque du Soleir, but they still had several very entertaining acts. Our favorites were:

Mao – hand to hand balancing by the Garzas
Teeny – risely by max & Roberto Laurino
Me – the German wheel by Andrei Roublev and cube juggling by Danny Perez

Unfortunately, as in most performances, photos were not allowed.