Carrie Goes Baywatch: Running on the Beach

Once upon a time, an evil witch used her candy house to lure Hansel and Gretel into the forest, trying to get them lost so she could cook them in her stove. Luckily, H & G had some breadcrumbs on them, which they used to find their way home. A triumph for carbs! **

If a witch wanted to get me lost, she wouldn't need a candy house. I lose my way ridiculously easily. Once, when I was a Junior in high school, I tried to drive from my house to my school and I ended up in another state. Seriously.

For this and other reasons, I've always dreaded running while on vacation. I'm insecure enough when I'm running without worrying about unfamiliar hills, dangerous parts of town, and the disaster of my directional "skills."

Skipping workouts can be murder on my running schedule — when I miss a week of running, I tend to give up altogether. In an effort to break this trend, I've issued a personal challenge to myself to try to run every time I go to a new town, even if it's just for a day or two.

So far, it's going well. When I went to Lake Martin for work, I discovered that I actually like running on hills. When I go to see my parents, I enjoy running in the neighborhood where I spent a couple formative years. But my favorite challenge has been running on the beach, which I did last weekend when I went to Jacksonville, Florida, to celebrate my sister's birthday.

There are few things better than running on the beach as the sun rises. Besides being tremendously beautiful, it was something I never thought I could do (just walking on the beach is hard enough sometimes). I had an amazing morning, and I even set a personal best for the mile (according to Lance Armstrong on my Nike Plus). I think there was something about the challenge of doing something new, plus the overwhelming beauty of the ocean, that helped me push myself further without even realizing it.

Of course, I also got lost ... I forgot to pay attention to which boardwalk I started from. I made it back by listening to my Nike Plus (when I realized I was lost, I turned and ran exactly that distance back), and by following my own footsteps (I was lucky the tide wasn't coming in). It's no breadcrumbs in the forest, but it'll do.

** Note: I'm pretty sure I did not tell this story accurately. But it works for my own purposes, so I'll leave it. Please don't fault me for my Fairy Tale reconstructionism.