Railroads, Rivers, Route 66 and Running: New Jersey Trip

There is a commercial for a credit card company that tells prices for various items and ends with the final item being "priceless" While I was in New Jersey taking my final run before returning home I thought about that commercial in terms of my visit because it summed up my feelings about the trip. "Airfare - $$$$$" "Race Entry Fees - $$$$" "Racing on consecutive weekends with my son-in-law and my daughter - PRICELESS". While I was in New Jersey I had the opportunity to race a 20K with Tom on my first weekend there and then race a 5K with Stacie the next weekend. Special memories.

The race with Tom was held in Piscataway, New Jersey and we raced on a nice loop course in a park across the street from the Rutgers Football Stadium. It was cold for the majority of the race and overcast but there was no wind so we both had good races.

The following weekend was cold again, (it was cold the entire time that I was in New Jersey), when Stacie and I ran at Duke Farms, a beautiful conservation facility. The highlight of the race for me was finishing, turning around to get ready to watch Stacie finish and hearing her say, "Hey Old Man" as she was the next finisher behind me. We had run a race together last year in St. Louis and she was several minutes behind, and I ran about much faster this year. I was so proud of her.

Another highlight of this race was meeting and spending time talking with Joetta Clark Diggs a four time Olympian.

While the races were highlights of the trip the certainly weren't the only ones. It was such fun spending time with my grandson and granddaughter, watching movies, reading, and playing games. Being with them reminds me why it is a good thing that young people have children. They can flat wear out an "old man". :)

And then there was time with "Barley". What a livewire she is!!!

The pictures from my first training run are quite a bit different from my training the last time I was there in October.

Two other highlights of the trip were Chase's musical program of "Charlotte's Web" and a rainy day trip to New York to visit the USS Intrepid Museum. The USS Intrepid visit brought back some amazing memories because it was the same class of Carrier that I first shipped out to Vietnam on, The USS Oriskany. Despite the rain we had a great time. We went after Stacie and I got back from our race. Chase volunteered and was chosen to be part of an educational presentation, we were so proud of him.