My idea of Fun occasionally involves long distance running in beautiful places. This weekend, I was lucky enough to be able to run in one of the beautiful places, the Marin Headlands. Several girlfriends and I were signed up for the Golden Gate 50K trail race. We planned a weekend of it, heading to the coast on Friday evening.

We headed to the race start early Saturday, and pulled into the Rodeo Beach parking lot which was shrouded in fog. There was wind coming off of the ocean and runners were huddled in groups waiting for the bathrooms. It was chilly standing around, but it promised to be good running weather.

The race course consisted of a couple of loops to make up the full 50K distance. I don’t mind looped courses so much, but this course would would bring us back by the cars at the start/finish around mile 18. Your car becomes oh, so tempting when you’re legs are getting tired and the siren call of the post race cheeseburger is strong. I told all of my runner friends, “Do NOT let me stop at the car!!”

The race took us out on one of my very favorite sections of trail – a stretch of coast called Pirate’s Cove. A beautiful single tract trail winds its way along the hillside, rolling up and down. The views are breathtaking. At one point, steep stairs lead down to a secluded, small beach, but during the race, we head up the steep stairs to the hilltop. There was high fog through this stretch, and looking south, the hills were hidden by grey mist.

Later in the race, we climbed up to some spectacular views of the Golden Gate and the whole San Francisco Bay. There are beautiful private homes along this stretch (one house in particular always has me exclaiming, “I love that house!”) and I always  wonder about the people who live there. Do they realize how lucky they are? Do they savor it?

I had a couple of low moments during the race, a few times where my legs hurt or I cramped a little bit – completely expected when running that long. But overall, I had one of those perfect days when your body is moving well – legs, breath, heart and mind working in concert. Beautiful views coupled with great weather and great friends to share it with.

The ironic part of the day came later that evening. We arrived back at our hotel after dinner at Marin Brewing Company (great burgers and great beer) to a large sign on the elevator reading “Out of Service”.  0_0   We had just ran 32 miles with 5,000 feet of climbing and the thought of climbing three flights of stairs to our room….  Well.

A hotel employee walked in and found us staring blankly at the broken elevator, our post run bags in hand.  He very kindly assisted, carrying our bags and leading us up the outside stairs.  His comment, “The stairs are good exercise.” We could only laugh and agree with him.