Running... Georgia

We just spent a week in gorgeous Jekyll Island, Georgia. If you haven't been, you should go... it's so serene and peaceful there. It's tucked away from traffic and tourists, live oak covered roads and sand dollar covered beaches, wild horses roaming at Cumberland Island which is just 45 minutes away, I mean, seriously, it's THE perfect getaway. Here are a gazillion pictures to prove it's beauty just in case you don't believe me..

My view on my morning runs

Every morning I went running and walking on the spectacular beaches. Now, I did have to wait until 8:30 or so because of high tide  (it was REALLY high) but when it receded, the beach was a treasure trove. We found dozens of sand dollars (only keeping the dead ones) and conch shells, and jelly fish and horseshoe crabs and fiddler crabs and rainbow colored seashells. It was such a gorgeous site.

On Wednesday, we went to Cumberland Island, which you have to take a ferry to, and it's basically an all day walking adventure. We took a picnic basket with us and enjoyed sitting on the beach and watching dolphins play. We saw dolphins EVERY DAY of our trip! Cumberland has wild horses, crabs that scamper right in front of your feet and majestic maritime forests.

If you can't tell, I'm head-over-heels in love with this place. It was vacation and I was up at 6 am ready to go every day. We spent one day riding bikes on the paved trails that go all the way around the island. We took a dolphin seeing boat ride one day (or attempted to, we had to turn back because of a storm), we saw deer and a bobcat one evening and on our last day, we watched a sea turtle being released back into the wild.

So, also on our last day, we did the Turtle Crawl 5k. The funds went to support the Sea Turtle Center (which is who released the rehabilitated turtle back into the ocean). It was an amazing, fast, flat course. Some of the turns were a little tight, especially when we had to turn around and come back, passing runners on a sidewalk was tough, but the entire time you could see the beach, which made it alright. AND, best of all, I PLACED in the race! 3rd.... probably would have been 2nd if I hadn't stopped to go to the bathroom 3 minutes in, but I literally did not think I could hold it for 3.1 miles. It was the perfect end to the perfect vacation. I highly recommend any and every active person make this trip at least once in your life. There are a million things to do while getting away from the rest of the world. 

*side note: I have now completed my 5th & 6th races of the year. I did the Run Wild 5k on 5/12 (placed 5th in my age group, 95th overall) and of course, the Turtle Crawl 5k on 5/19 and placed 3rd in my age group with a time of 26:19.