I was so excited about posting about the race that I went out of order and forgot to share our Saturday adventure with Mary.  So here it goes.

What do YOU do the day before a race?  Rest your legs a bit and take it easy?  We did half of that.  We started the day off with a yummy breakfast at Portage Bay Cafe with Mary’s college friend Kerrie (whom I love because we made plans to go to Tilth with her and her husband sometime soon) and then headed to Husky Stadium to pick up our bibs for the race and knock another thing off of my master Seattle to-do list: go kayaking.

Since there were 3 of us, we ended up canoeing rather than kayaking, which was actually (I think) better, because the canoe seems a wee bit more stable.  Once we got in, we set out to explore Montlake, which is pretty freaking gorgeous.  Going under the bridges makes you feel like you’re back at the boat ride at Disneyland (if you grew up in SoCal and went to Disneyland every other weekend like I did), except you actually have to row and you aren’t stuck to some mechanical track.

See?  It does look like the boat ride.

Mike navigated…

And only got us stuck a couple of times.

Mary looked all kinds of sexy.

We saw geese and goslings.

And turtles!  I named them Michael, Tony, Amy and Jimmy.  There was another one looking in the wrong direction on another log nearby, but I didn’t get a picture of him.  I named him Derek.

The only problem with kayaking/canoeing in Montlake is that after you’ve lazily drifted past a certain point and are ready to head back, the only way to get to the dock is to navigate through choppy open water and get attacked by speedboats and huge yachts.  This results in a rather strenuous workout.  After 2 hours of canoeing, I was ready for a nap.

So we napped.  Then Mary and I walked to the seafood market down the street and got some amazing Copper River Salmon and made a kickass dinner to help fuel our bodies for the race.  Obviously, paying almost $30 a pound for salmon paid off.