A tale of three mud runs

 If your friends decided to do crazy obstacles, or run through a creek in November, or crawl through a three foot deep mud pit would you do it? Well, Josh and I would!

Our obstacle course fun started in July. We signed up to do the Warrior Dash with a group of friends. The Warrior Dash is a 5k run though rough terrain that is filled with ridiculous obstacles like cargo nets, mud pits, and giant walls. The day of the Dash was insanely hot and Josh and I didn't run until 2:30. Most of our friends ran earlier in the day. Josh and I made our way through many of the obstacles. There were high walls to jump over and wire to crawl under. Creeks to run through and then steep muddy banks to climb up. About half way through the dash I started feeling pretty bad. I kept getting dizzy and feeling like I was going to pass out. with about 1/4 mile to go, I had to stop. Fellow runners alerted the first aid tent and they sent a truck out to get me. I got to the first aid station and they gave me water to drink and took my vitals. My blood pressure was really low and so was my heart rate. After a few minutes I started feeling faint again and before I knew it, two guys threw me on a stretcher and hooked me up to a monitor, blood pressure cuff, oxygen, and gave me an IV in my muddy arm. I had heat exhaustion and I am so glad I stopped when I did. That day, two men died out at the Warrior Dash from heat stroke and another 14 had to be taken to the hospital. After my bag of IV fluids went in, one of the EMT's started asking me which hospital I wanted to be taken to. As much fun as an ambulance ride sounded, I refused. Then two guys argued over it for awhile, but I told them I was a nurse and promised to go to the ER if I started to feel worse. I was allowed to leave with Josh (who had to finish the race and then come find me) but I was given strict instructions to stay indoors and take it easy for the next 48 hours.

muddy Josh after the race

So that wasn't the most fun. All my friends finished and I felt bad that I did not. I quickly signed us up for the next Warrior Dash that was close to us! So in October, Josh and I headed out to St. Louis. This run was less challenging in terms of the terrain, but had much harder obstacles. Josh and I were in good spirits as we ran, climbed, and jumped. This time I made it to the end and was rewarded with having to jump over fire and then crawl through a three foot deep mud pit. The mud was sooooo cold. As we were there by ourselves, we didn't have anyone to take muddy pictures :( This run was a lot of fun and I didn't almost die so we are calling this one a win!

Made it across the fire filled, muddy finish line where my free beer was waiting!

Our last run was over the weekend. This one was the Run Ruckus. This was a true mud run. Josh and I went with our friend Kat and Josh's brother Nick. We went in costume as the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Everyone loved our costumes and cheered us on! At the start of the race, I was a little disappointed by the look of the course. It looked like it wouldn't be challenging at all. Boy was I wrong. I should have noticed that the people running were all muddy....not like the warrior dash where people just got muddy at the end....soon I figured out why. The very first obstacle was a series of walls that you had to climb over like the warrior dash. Unlike the dash, the ground was very squishy mud. I nearly lost a shoe trying to walk through it and then I got my leg stuck and couldn't move!!!  Then they had crazy ropes over water that you had  shimmy across. Then giant "mud mountains and valleys". They were giant mud hills that you had to climb up and then down into a pit of water....repeat about 6 times. There was no avoiding mud!!! We ran through creeks and climbed up ropes, and crawled though drains and under nets....it was so much fun.

We went as the Ninja Turtles! Everyone loved our costumes!

Running hard!!! Already covered in mud!

Giant cargo nets that you had to roll across

weeeeeeeeeee!

trying to make our way across by putting our feet into nooses.

Turtle Power

Germany part 6: More beer!

We woke up around 8 on Friday....sleeping in rocks! Then we caught the breakfast buffet at our hotel. German breakfasts are very different from our own. There were a lot of different breads, cold cuts and cheeses. There weren't many hot items at any of the different breakfast buffets. I basically made a little sandwich and had a bowl of cereal for breakfast. I have to say, that I prefer Irish breakfast over German breakfast. Josh really enjoyed the German breakfast though.

We walked back to Oktoberfest (luckily it was only about 0.7miles from our hotel). It was about 10am and a little early for beer in my opinion so we stopped by a few tents and took some pictures.

The Hippodrom tent

this one reminded me of a circus!

Fischer Vroni tent (this is the fishy tent!)

It had a boat inside!

Ambrustschutzen

they have a crossbow competition in this tent!

Augustiner tent

We decided to stop in for a drink!

Josh had wanted to try the beer at this beer tent. It is supposed to be the best beer at Oktoberfest and it ended up being our favorite! As the minutes went by, more and more people were pouring into the tent so we decided to hang out here for awhile. It was a bit early still, but since it was Friday, we ran the risk of not being able to sit down later.

I did not drink 2...although I currently look like I did

This has become Josh's favorite picture pose.

YAY!!! Success! 

The "proper" way to drink a big beer

I think josh is full of beer

No more beer for him!

New Friends! Josh had a lot of fun talking with Marc, the guy in the red shirt. We were in this tent for hours :)

All done. I should have taken a picture of the yummy half chicken...but I was half way through it before I thought of it!

 By the time we left, the place was packed and finding a seat was next to impossible. 2pm on a Friday is very different than 2pm on a Wednesday! So we tried to continue our quest to see all the beer tents, but walking through the street was getting harder and harder.

Hacker-Festzelt

Bavarian Heaven!

Beer horses!

Pschorr-Braurosl

Me and the horsey!

Schottenhamel

This is where the first keg is tapped to start Oktoberfest!

Lowenbrau

Paulaner tent...security was super tight by this point and would not let me in with my camera.

sweet shoes

random

We finished up our day by doing a little more shopping in Munich. At a sporting goods store I "met" my favorite soccer player!

Josh and I had an early flight and had to be up at 3am (yuck), so we called it a day and headed back to the hotel. I had a lot of fun on this trip, but I couldn't wait to get home. I had a special someone waiting for me, after all

Germany part 5: Munich

After our trip to Dachau, we decided to spend a little time exploring Munich because the beer tents were all crazy full. We figure we had a whole day to go back to Oktoberfest, so we could spend some time in the city.

Josh in the heart of Munich

European streets are so pretty!

I loved all the window boxes full of flowers! We saw these everywhere in Germany.

After spending some time exploring Munich, we were hungry and tired. We decided to walk back to the Oktoberfest grounds to get dinner. Our tour guide had told us that there were a number of Oktoberfest specialties and we wanted to try as many of them as possible.

On of those specialties were these fish. They were being roasted outside and smelled wonderful. It was a little pricey, but worth it!

 Another Oktoberfest treat....giant Pretzels! These sure do put our tiny, greasy mall pretzels to shame.

Dinner! (nom nom nom)