Happy Holidays Everyone!

2010 Marine Corps Marathon

We returned to the real Washington again this year for the 2010 Marine Corps Marathon.

One of the best parts was being in a place where there are seasons! Look at the beautiful fall colors from the airplane.

We made a stop at the Rally to Restore Sanity/Fear with Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert. So much fun!

We got up around 2:30am Pacific Time to get to the race, but seeing D.C. in the early hours was beautiful.

Start Line



Some Wisconsin fans proving: 1. We're everywhere. 2. We just can't help ourselves.



Running through Georgetown

Michael finished his first marathon...officially making us a power couple! (The jackets help.)

2010 Nike Womens Marathon

Nikki and her friend Janine travelled to San Francisco, CA for the 2010 Nike Womens Marathon. (While we had a great time, neither of us endorses this marathon....really, do a different one.....)

It's always fun to play with candy corn on the airplane!

The Bay Area from the air.

Nike spent most of their money on the expo...not so much on race planning/oganization. But the expo was AWESOME.

NikeTown San Francisco was transformed for the marathon. They sold only marathon merchandise and shoes for the whole weekend.

NWM had only four start corrals, about 5000 people per corral. (By comparison, Rock n Roll Seattle had 35 start corrals, reducing the number of people in each corral to 1000.) The first half of the race was more like playing Frogger than running a marathon.

Running by the Golden Gate Bridge was awesome.

The hills, temperature drops and pouring rain were not so awesome.

The chocolate mile was a fun idea, but not too many folks love eating chocolate at mile 21. We stashed ours in Janine's backpack for later.

The wet, sloppy finish line....which was out of space blankets, finisher shirts and finisher necklaces. Race director=Fail. (We've STILL not received our promised finisher necklaces a month and a half later.)

But, we both finished and had tons of fun!

The best part of the day was the nice warm bus back to our hotel!

Nevada Tour 2010

After Michael's return home, we spent a week in Nevada and California on a much-needed vacation.

We started in Las Vegas for a long weekend, and got to witness Wisconsin's thrashing of UNLV.

Then we headed on a long drive up to Lake Tahoe, and stopped in Death Valley along the way.


Michael found us a waterfall in the middle of Death Valley!

Lake Tahoe included lots of hiking...
...and mountain biking.

Then, we finished with a weekend in Reno for Tailhook 2010.