The Most Debaucherous Almost Half Marathon Ever

So yes, Saturday I walked 11.5 miles.  The garmin says we did 13.25 miles and took about 5 hours, however, some of them were WAY too fast to be walking, so I think we got about 1-2 miles in the car.  So totally an estimate, but I know FOR SURE we did more than 11.  Why would I just decide to leave my house and spend that long on my feets?  Because – it sounded like fun.  I know, I’m completely nuts.

We started the day around 12:30 leaving the house (Zliten was aiming for 11am, I was aiming for noon, so a little late but it worked out).  I was wearing my new “adventure pants” (spf 20 lightweight breathable khakis that can convert from pants to shorts with a few zips – and even have an attachable bag to store them in), which got their own theme song – something like “Adventure pants, adventure pants, doin’ the dance, adventure pants…”.  We remembered sunscreen this time, which was excellent, as we spent about the next 7 hours in the lovely sunny day.

Earlier in the week I had started to plan the route/stops, but Zliten and I discussed it, and decided just to go with the flow.  So we left without a map, without a plan, with just a few ideas of landmarks we’d like to walk past/see.  The one thing we had decided was we were grabbing lunch somewhere on the way.  We set out actually pretty hungry, but as we walked, we just started getting pickier and pickier, and the one place we settled on wasn’t open for another hour when we passed it – so we ended up almost downtown (about 6.5 miles) before we passed the famous Texas Chili Parlor, and popped in to split a sampler and a margarita.

Thus begun a long, lovely, epic, and debaucherous night.  We employed the “one drink and move on” method at most places, and stuck with margaritas before sunset, and moved onto whiskey after dark (this may have been a bad decision, but anyhoo).  Pro tip: after walking a half marathon and drinking all day – trying to subsist on some pineapple, a few bites of chili, one piece of fried fish, and a few fries?  Makes for a bit of a fuzzy night 12 hours from the time we left the house.

What?  I was just trying to get a little yoga in…heh.  Sadly (or happily, not sure which), there are no pictures from that day.  I just forgot to take any, but Zliten I guess decided to NOT chronicle the day.

Some highlights though:

-Having the endurance and drive to do a walk like that.  Feeling totally free in my hometown (not having to worry about my car or transportation or whatnot).  Sure I was totally wasted the next day (and still recovering a little today still) but man, that was cool.

-It totally felt like a mini-vacation in my own city.  I mean, who just walks around like that seeing the sights if you live there?  It was awesome!

-The tiniest bar in Texas – the owner and bartnender were super friendly, and they had pretty tasty 2 dollar margaritas…

-Sunset from the top deck of the Motlov with a pomegranite margarita.  Awesome.

-The deck at the Patio.  There were huge animal heads on the wall, the fireplace was nice, and it was a really nice place.  However, after the sun set pretensious people came in and kinda ruined the vibe, and I felt rather underdressed in my sneaks and khakis.

-Getting denied access to the last bar because I was too far gone.  Yes, this is what the lack of food does.  Good thing I’m not easily embarrassed…

-Good friends that came and saved the day at the end of the night.

Next time, we are going to learn from our (my) mistakes, and try to enforce an earlier curfew, and make sure to get a good, hearty, healthy meal in us before heading out instead of leaving it up to chance.  But – this was way too fun.  I think I prefer hanging out downtown right before/after sunset – rather than closing them out at 2am.  I think we’ll definitely have to do this again soon – but not too soon. 🙂

Do you find you walk more on vacation or at home?  Have you ever just “seen the sights” or pretended you were on vacation in your hometown?