Posts tagged park

Sometimes despite my best efforts to protect myself from the fauna while I’m out in the park, I forget about the flora! Ouch! They don’t call it sawgrass for nothing!

It was about 15 degrees cooler due to the storm that came through last night, which means it didn’t get any higher than 95 today. That actually felt good - and the breeze was refreshing rather than a blow torch. The poor trees in the park are suffering, some already turning yellow in this heat. There were fallen leaves all over the walking trail.

I hadn’t been able to walk for so long, that I over did it and began to feel pain in my upper chest. Ow! Had to rest. Did not do my usual two laps, barely finished one. Frightened me a little. In retrospect I think I used the wrong playlist on my iPod and started out way too fast.

I usually use my “Get Hiking” playlist, which starts out at a much slower pace then builds slowly. Instead I used my “Get Walking” playlist which starts out much faster & sustains a tougher burn then cools down. Add that to the fact that the walking trail, depending on the direction you walk it, immediately goes into an incline for about 25 meters. Normally it’s not a problem, but when you’ve laid off as long as I have it’s not good to take up where you left off. I sat at the strength training station to catch my breath a few minutes, then took it up again, walking back to the car to my cool-down music.

I’ll share my exercise playlists on my next post!

realgenevievej:

My mom sent me these pics today, she is taking care of her while im in ny…isn’t she biiiggg!!! i miss her soo much!!! :/

Genevieve’s sweet little pet bunny reminds me of the wild rabbits we have out at Hafer Park where I go walking (when it isn’t roasting temperature outside). I feel so bad for the wild life out there in this crazy heat. The ducks at least have their pond to keep cool, although it’s got to be like swimming in bath water! I wonder how much trouble I’d get in for going out into the wooded area and sticking the contents of a nice, cool bag of baby carrots under one of the pine trees out there for the rabbits. They’ve got signs posted saying “do not feed”, but it’s so hot, even the trees are suffering. My wild “pets” are the only ones I have!

This is where I come to walk, to read, to watch other runners & walkers. I love being around trees. I have to be near them. They sustain me. And in this triple-digit heat, they are quite necessary! They take the edge off of a hot wind.

If I weren’t fasting today, I’d be there preparing for two laps, which takes me about an hour to go 2.5 miles or 4 kilometers. [1 kilometer is more than 1/2 mile but less than 3/4 mile. In fact it’s more like 2/3 mile. So when you get to the 3/4 mile marker on the path, you’ve gone past the 1 km mark.]

When you get to about here you can catch a whiff of the pines in the humid breeze mingled with the scent of something that’s been dead a while..