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Mac Visits: Day 3, Hiking Camelback

March 16, 2012 · by Ari ·

When I decided to take Mac on a hike, I immediately consulted my amazing friend and hiking expert, Diana.  Girl has done pretty much every hike in existence, and she gave me lots of great suggestions! Ultimately, I ended up choosing Camelback. It’s probably the most famous, it’s really pretty, and the one time I did it before, it totally kicked my butt.

This morning, we got an early start and begin our hike on the Echo Canyon Summit Trail.

"YAY, hiking!!!"

I’ve actually only been hiking a couple of times. It’s not something I would want to do solo, but I really enjoy it with friends, and we have tons of trails here in Arizona.

Summit Trail is well known for the beautiful views, as well as the challenging climb. There was lots of all fours action, and on the way down, I even chose to slide on my butt a time or two.

Mac was super popular on this hike! All the guys kept commenting on his Kentucky shirt.

We took lots of breaks to take pictures and enjoy the views.

Sipping from my camelback on Camelback.

 

Yeah, we climbed those.

 

"RAAAHHHH!!!!! I climbed a mountain!!!!"

 

That's me, and my butt. Climbing rocks.

The Summit Trail is also known for the panoramic view once you make it to the top. You overlook the entire city, and it is really beautiful. Being on the top of a mountain is a pretty freaking sweet feeling. I love looking down and seeing what I’ve accomplished!

Check us out! We are tough!

You know what I do not prefer? Going down the mountain. Seriously, I would rather go up twice than up and down.

The hike ended up taking us a little over two hours, which is a little slow, but fine by me. We certainly weren’t our for time. I only brought little Garmi around to keep track of mileage.

We promptly returned to my house (after stopping for coffee, obviously) for some Maple Bacon Buttermilk Pancakes and eggs which were devoured long before I even thought about taking any pictures. We were hungry!

Tonight we have big plans that include Barrio Cafe and margaritas! Have a great Friday everyone!

Filed Under: Uncategorized · Tagged: camelback, echo canyon summit trail, friends, hiking, mac, pancakes

Mac Visits: Day 2

March 16, 2012 · by Ari ·

I hope you realize that if you ever want to come and visit me, a few things will happen.

  1. I will cook you lots and lots of food, most of which will be “Skinnified”.
  2. You will get dog hair all over you. The thing is, unless I vacuum every surface of my house 10x a day, followed by some good old lint rolling, Winston’s hair will win this battle, so I have just kind of learned to live with it. Things to consider before taking up an offer to hang on my couch/air mattress.
  3. You will get forced encouraged into workouts you probably never wanted to do have been dying to try! A few friends can attest to this.

Mac and I started our Thursday morning with spin class! I snuck him into the gym while rude girl wasn’t looking. Take that rude girl! HAH! Then we did some strength training (that’s twice in one week, friends!!), and went into class. I used to take Amanda’s Thursday class pretty regularly, but then I started taking Thursdays as a rest day and became pretty dedicated to Linda, you know my spin teacher bff that doesn’t even know my name, but I think she’s so cool! Well, I was surprised when a new teacher walked in and announced she’d be subbing.

This teacher, Jenna, was ridiculous! Awesome. but ridiculous. Imagine 80s workout video (ie: Suzanne Summers) meets spin class. She was overly enthusiastic, but it was cracking me up more than annoying me and her class kicked my butt! The only thing that bothered me was that she never told us where to be gear wise. She just kept saying things like “Bump it up!” “More gears!!” Well I realized pretty quickly, when I was at gear 24 (the highest the bike goes) and she was still telling people to add gears, that perhaps I wasn’t quite understanding what she meant. Part of my brain spent a lot of class stressing about how I couldn’t be sure if I was doing it right, but tried my best to just enjoy the class and not worry about being “right”. Easier said than done for this type A personality. I ended the class a sweaty mess, and I definitely felt like I got a great workout!

After class, we cleaned ourselves up then went to meet my dad and Hermano at Golf Land for some mini golf! I am so bad at mini golf, but I’ve always really loved it. Mac and I started talking in the parking lot about how neither of us are very good at mini golf, so we’re not as competitive as usual–we only like to actually put forth competitive effort with things we are skilled in, otherwise it can be embarrassing 😉 I also mentioned how my dad and Hermano are both super competitive just like us, and within minutes of playing my dad was haggling me like the opposing team at a sports game!

The funniest part is that my dad is actually really good at mini golf, but he looks absolutely ridiculous! He gets in this deep squat and takes what feels like hours to make his turn. It was cracking me up, but apparently it worked because he won with a 45! I came in second, then Hermano, and Mac got an honorable 4th place 🙂

The dragon!! This hole used to scare the crap out of me as a kid!

I used to hate this one! Hermano took about 15 swings hitting it everyone except where it was supposed to go. Then I schooled him and got it on my first shot. 😉

Tick tock, tick tock.

Probably gloating his victory.

After mini golf, we grabbed some fro yo, then headed back to my place so Mac could watch the Kentucky game and I could get some work done. Then, I went out to rehearsal, and the rest of the night was pretty uneventful. We had an other super late night with a 10:30 bed time. Ummm yeah, we’re old. I should maybe be embarrassed, but I’m totally okay with it!

Filed Under: Uncategorized · Tagged: family, friends, golf land, hermano, mac, mini golf, spin

Mac Visits: Day 1

March 16, 2012 · by Ari ·

I don’t know about you, but I have had the most fantastic week! Work has been fairly light due to Spring break, and Tuesday night I got a visitor! My amazing friend Mac came all the way out from NYC to watch tons of episodes of Seinfeld hang out with me 🙂

Wednesday morning we tried to hit up the gym, but the very unhappy and rude front desk lady told Mac if he wanted to use a guest pass, he would have to pay $15 per day. Seriously??? Don’t most gyms offer buddy passed? She was so rude too. So instead, we drove down to the lake with the duckies and did a 3 mi run/walk. It was beautiful out, so I think we both ended up being pretty happy about taking our workout out doors.

After our run, we grabbed coffee, had some breakfast, did a little shopping and before we knew it, it was time for lunch. We went to Pita Jungle–one of my favs! Mac got the chipotle black bean burger.

Yummmm. I've had this before, and I love it!

And I had the broiled chicken salad.

Obviously I was a big fan.

Then we took some down time at my house before I had to head to work. Mac and Clemmie became BFFs.

“Love me.”

When I came home we had some Chicken “Pad” Thai.

Spaghetti squash in place of noodles is one of my favorite swaps ever.

Yummmm

Then we proceeded to watch Seinfeld until bedtime. We’re so crazy!

Filed Under: Uncategorized · Tagged: chicken pad thai, cooking, friends, mac, pita jungle, restaurants, running

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