Lancaster, PA Trip

On Friday, Nate and I both took a vacation day and drove to Lancaster, PA.  :)  We were going there for the Bird-in-hand 5k and Half Marathon.  We left our house at 10am and got to Lancaster around 1:30pm.  We headed right to the farm to pick up our runners packets.  I was only doing the 5k and Nate was doing the Fireman's Challenge, which was the 5k and the half marathon.  :)

Here's the tent with the registration pick-up and the expo.

This is the course map for the 5k.

This is the course map for the half.

We had some time to kill before we had to be back to do the 5k.  I asked Nate if we could go to the Kitchen Kettle Village in Intercourse, PA so I could get my Pineapple Salsa.  :)

After I got my salsa, Nate and I drove over towards the hotel.  We picked the Holiday Inn Express which just happened to be next to the Rockvale Outlets.  We had about a half hour till we could check into the hotel.  So, we went over to the outlets.  We went to the Famous Footwear outlet and looked around.  Then we went to Under Armour outlet.  Nate found some shorts 3 for $30 so he got them.  It was finally time to check in at the hotel.  We unpacked and relaxed till we had to change for the 5k run/walk.

I looked in my runners packet and there was some cool stuff in there.  :)  A water bottle, a COOKIE from the Good 'N Plenty Restaurant, (Nate had a whoopie pie in his packet), block, dried kelp, pen, manual, and shirt.

I'm not a fan of the color green but the logo is pretty sweet.  :)

Here's the block that was in the packet.  It's cute!  :)

Finally, it was time to change and head back over to the farm to get ready for the 5k.  There was a bunch of hot air balloons being launched off.  Hot Air balloons are always so fun to see.

I saw this Amish family.  The color 'sage' must be in right now.  A lot of Amish were wearing this color.  I thought it was really cute when each family had the same colors on.  They all matched.  LOL  Anyways, this young Amish woman has 4 little blonde haired boys.  They were adorable.

We headed over to the start line.  There were a few buggies and a pony cart waiting near there for their Amish owners.

We finally started the 5k race.  It was so humid out.  There was a little bit of a breeze but not much.  The run/walk went around and literally through Amish farm land.  LOL  I don't know why but I found it easier to run through the field then on the pavement itself.  We had lots of Amish families on the course, clapping or motivating you as you ran/walked by.  There was also Amish kids handing out water at the water stops.  So cute!  :)  Nate went on my pace.  When I ran, he ran, when I needed to walk he walked with me.  We ended up dead last.  But there were some people that couldn't even finish the race and asked to be picked up so to me even though we came in last, we didn't give up.  We did finish.  Once we turned to the finish line field, we ran to the finish.  Nate let me cross over first.  We finished in 58 minutes.  I was so HOT and sweaty.  LOL   I grabbed 2 bottles of water, an apple, a banana, and a small bag of kettle chips.  We cooled off for a few minutes and headed to the car to go back to the hotel for hot showers.  :)  We also wanted dinner.  We both wanted a burger but we didn't want to sit down at a restaurant all hot and sweaty.  We decided to get Wendy's.  We hadn't been there in forever.  We both got the baconater.  OMG.....it was so good.  :)


Saturday, morning we got up at 5:30am to leave at 6am for Nate's big race.  :)  We got there a few minutes after 6am and walked on in and hung out till the start of the race.  (which was 7:30am).


Here's a picture of Nate at the Race sign.

Finally, time to head over to the start line.  Here's Nate warming up and stretching.

Here's a picture of Nate's shirt.  He made a shirt where anyone who's supported his weight loss journey got their name put on his shirt.  The shirt was really big on him.

And they're off...... Nate is pointing at me.   Vella Shpinga Nate!  :)  That means "Let's Run" in PA Dutch.

I waited at the finish line for Nate.  There were lots of Amish kids and families there to support their friends and relatives running the half.  These kids were sitting across from me.  They were cute.  Their mom went to walk around with the smaller kids and had these kids wait at the wagon.

Here's the kids again just waiting.  :)

I couldn't resist taking this picture.  His mother sat next to me with her kids.  She was holding the baby with her back towards me when I snuck this picture of her little one.  :)

This is a picture of the 2nd finisher.  He was right behind the first finisher.  They finished around 1:13.  This little Amish boy on the right is looking right into the camera.  He's the brother to the cutie in the picture above.

Here comes Nate........

Nate started high fiving strangers.  LOL

 Here's Nate as he's crossing the finish line....

Nate's exact finish time was 2:32:57.  His best time yet!  :)  Here's Nate soaked with sweat.  LOL

Here's a close-up of Nate's medal.  How cool is that?

As we left, I noticed we parked our car right on a huge cow patty.  LOL  GROSS!

As we were leaving the race area I saw these Amish bikes up against a building.

Nate grabbed me another apple since I loved the one I had the night before.  It was sooooo good and crisp. I can't wait for fall.  :D  I wished I had more of these apples.

 We had a late check out at our hotel since we're preferred members.  Nate was able to take a nice hot shower and change before we got on the road to head home.  Here's a picture of Nate ready to go home.  :)

On the way home...............It was a fun trip.  I want to go back!  :)