rhododendron festival

Port Townsend #3: Rhody Run 10k

That’s right, what kind of moron goes on holidays and signs up for a race, last-minute?

Yeah, haha. This moron!

It was very much on a whim. I saw that they had a race as part of their annual rhododendron festival called ‘Rhody Run’ and was like yep that’s it. I’m signing up! And sooo I did, haha. I couldn’t sign up only due to entries being maxed out, but they were allowing the day-before registration so we spent the day out at Fort Worden and then swung by the Fairgrounds around 3pm to sign up, and it was effortless, took 10 mins. Then the race was the next morning!

Ian got to dig through shirts to find one I wanted to wear, and off we went!

Of course we’d walked over 10k that day alone, and basically spend the rest of the afternoon drinking beer, but heyyyy…why not do a race? I slept HORRIBLY the entire weekend, which was the only downer part of the time but oh well.

Sunday dawned bright and early and we were back at the Fairgrounds (ok like a 7 minute drive hahahah) and I had my bib on ready to race!

Pre-race

The race had so many participants, they said it was a record sell-out. They had 10k and then 5k starting immediately afterwards. We got in line and were off!

Not gonna lie, I was hot already. I was very unused to the sun (hello, it hasn’t been sunny and warm for ONE day here in Victoria..not one day) and I was wearing long sleeves, gloves, long pants to run in every single day and freezing. So I ended up wearing my sleeping shorts for the race, hahah since I had only packed long pants/spandex tights due to it being so miserably cold the entire ‘spring’.

It was a challenging course, a few rolling hills and then QUITE the hill at oh… KM 5-6 I think? I can’t remember exactly other than cursing myself for signing up hahaha. Also someone was playing Vangelis’ Chariots of Fire soundtrack at like KM 3 and it made me feel really good, like Rocky!!

There was one screaming downhill at like KM 7 I think, and wow it was nuttssss…I was pretty sure I was going to fall hahah.

I was running alone a lot, there was one guy ahead of me who stopped to walk at like KM 8? The top woman was unreachable to me, but I held 2nd place the entire way which felt really nice 🙂

Zipped to the finish, and immediately took off my shirt, I was so hot. Also forgot that I’d packed my worst, saggiest sports bra b/c I really didn’t think we’d be running that much. Hah, whoops! Then the marine fog rolled in and I felt cold again.

We enjoyed some post-race snacks and Ian snapped some pics for me, and I was the happy recipient of a medal for first in my AG and a $200 gift card to Amazon for being second female. YEAH!!! Thanks Port Townsend, you rock!!

Next up: Fourth and final farewell to Port Townsend

Port Townsend Part #2

Our first full day in Port Townsend, we decided to hang around town and visit the farmers market and Aldridge’s (very fancy, very $$$ specialty store) until the marine science centre opened at noon. We did miss the Rhododendron Festival Parade down main street, but there wasn’t enough time to get everything in I guess!

touch pools at the marine science centre

The farmer’s market was very well appointed and we ended up buying some salad greens to go with the truly ridiculous seafood I bought at the grocery store the day previous, and we stopped off at Aldridge’s to buy some very $$ garlic vinaigrette that I didn’t like *too oily, not at all vinegary enough!

Then it was time to head to the marine science centre plus museum, and also to visit the venerable grounds of Fort Worden.

So cool!

I loved the science centre, and a highlight was the octopus ‘Sylvia’ who was zooming around his aquarium tank. I have never seen such an active octopod! Go Sylvia!

Prickly urchins in the touch pool

Then we checked out the small marine science museum, and walked to the Fort Worden lighthouse, a few clicks away, but it was a nice day and finally warm and sunny, so we figured why not walk it out?

Then we went back to the car and drove closer to the parade grounds of Fort Worden, and parked to walk the trails to the artillery batteries, of which there are many. I do not like them, I think that they are dank, creepy and disturbing. Ian loved them. I just wanted to sit in the sun and snooze, hahaha.

It was a lovely day of being outside, in the sunshine. We haven’t strung together two nice days at all since, or before, so I think we were truly fortunate that one weekend.

And for dinner, we made shrimps and fish salad, and enjoyed a few bottles of beer out on the beach. Did I mention that the beaches were basically across the street from main street/the hotel? It was SO nice.

Next up: We take part in a historical Rhody Festival event: Rhody run 10k!

A long weekend in Port Townsend!

Wow been awhile. As I left, I had just started my new position (same job) and things got very busy for awhile, but it is a change for the better.

In the meantime, I am still counting down the days until my sabbatical, and we also enjoyed a long weekend in Washington in Port Townsend!

We stayed at the Palace Hotel in Pt. Townsend and had a loft bedroom with a kitchen!

It was a super awesome weekend. NOT cheap by any stretch of the imagination ($$$$$$$$$ for ferry, eating out, hotels, activities, booze, etc) but well worth it, given we haven’t really travelled much in oh, two years? THANKS pandemic…So, we were overdue I think.

It was pretty neat and very old-timey

Also we’ve had endless crap weather. Like, heat on in May kind of crap weather. And no signs of it improving either, so we’re feeling really stir-crazy with every single day being windy/freezing/raining/grey…No respite in sight. HOW?

Ok ran about the weather over.

First up in Port Townsend wasn’t even Port Townsend- it was in Sequim, about 20 mins away from Port Angeles at the Olympic Game Farm. We went there on a whim, when I saw an ad for it on the Coho haha. And it was a freaking blast! We bought bread (1 loaf) there and you pay $17/pp and drive-through a little animal safari. The critters were all over us hahaha. I did have a moderate buffalo freakout when one stuck his head in the car and basically mauled me with his giant 1ft long tongue-eeeek!!!

Ian got drooled all over by an elk. HAHA. It was so fun, Gidget didn’t know what to think, it was hilarious!

I highly recommend. And next up…Port Townsend marine science centre.