Thursday morning

Ken left yesterday morning for Southern California. He's down visiting friends and such. I spent an hour of my morning watching the sunrise with my dog Xiao from the bed. It was refreshing and relaxing.

I have been on so many hikes in the past weeks and have had no time to tell you about them. I keep going on my whikes and dog walks during the week which keeps my dogs fresh. Or in Ginnie's case destroyed. Last night we came home from a 3 and a half hour hike and she was beat. Could barely make it to the car, didn't want to go potties before bed. She was just hurting. I gave her some of her Happy Hips treats and let her do her thing. She worked hard on Wednesday and deserves a break today.

The weekend after the Coastal trail was our hike at Briones Regional Park. I'm excited about coming back here when it is cooler. The dogs can go everywhere! It's pretty similar to Wildcat except bigger and tougher! And there is virtually no water anywhere so I'll have to carry it for them. that's just part of being a mom I guess. then the next weekend tragedy struck. I was all set and pumped to go a hike at China Camp State Park when I became paralyzed by back pain Friday night. I put on some heat packs and took some tylenol. I figured, hoped..., I would be find in the morning. Saturday morning I felt even worse. I hadn't slept well and the pain had gotten worse. I took a shower to see if that would help. No luck there. So I had to scramble first thing to call my mentor and see if she could give Sam a ride. Then I spent the next five hours asleep on the couch with a hot back. Miraculously I felt all better around 11 am. Sam told me I didn't miss much. Too many bikers and no hills. Oh well. I tried to take it really easy the rest of the week. Really easy. Stretched a lot. Watched trashy tv. Then I was ready for Mt. Tam on Saturday! We had such a good time going in and out of the rolling fog. We didn't get to do the entire trail down to Stinson beach and back but we did a healthy 4 1/2 hour hike. Sadly dogs can't even go into Mt. Tam State Park on a leash! Haters. But they can go into the Municipal watershed next door on leash. So Sam and I plan on going back there on Sunday next weekend with the dogs for a leisurely hike.

This coming Saturday is the hike of death. Pleasanton Ridge Regional Park in mid July. Who in the their right mind would plan a hike in Pleasanton in July? I don't know. But I am going. I will conquer the hike and then probably pass out the rest of the day. No joke. These hikes really take a lot out of me. A lot more than I realize while I am hiking. This morning I woke up super sore from my hike yesterday. Sore enough that I am going to go home, take the dogs for a walk, and then take a nap. Then maybe get some Indian food with Sam.