Bucket List #52 - Watch the Sunrise from the top of Mt. Timpanogos = Complete

11pm: Left our casa Friday night
12am: Started hiking from the Timpooneke Trailhead

We are on our way!

This is probably about 2 miles into the hike....yummy snacks!

We hiked through lots of snow.  I don't love it!  Especially in the dark!

 3am: Reached the saddle

Here's a blurry view of Utah County from the saddle

Me at the saddle.  The saddle is about 5.5 miles into the hike with the hardest part of the hike still ahead of us.

This section is called the Stairs...basically just scaling a cliff.

 5am: Reached the summit!!  11,749 ft....a 4580 ft elevation gain from the trailhead.  Now that's some pretty hard core hiking in the middle of the night!

We made it!  Time to eat, relax, and wait for the sunrise.

Yippee!

Watching the sky get brighter and brighter was awesome!

The sun is almost here!!

 6:30am: First glimpse of the sun!

There it is!  So breathtaking!

Me and the sunrise!  Another bucket list item complete!

Good morning, sun!

Me and my girls on the top of Timp at sunrise!  Woop!

There's always gotta be at least one of these photos!  That's Utah Lake behind me.

It was a little chilly up there!

 7am: Started hiking back down

There's the little rocky trail down the mountain to the saddle.

I'm in love with this!

When I saw this photo I realized that I looked like a homeless person.  Rockin' it nonetheless!

I was just up on that peak behind me.  You can even see little people up there if you look hard enough.

 7:45am:  Reached the saddle again

Yep!  This is also taken on the saddle.

Hiking through more snow.  Boo!

Heather spent a lot of time on her hind end in the snow.  They are not friends!

The wildflowers were amazing!  And I love purple!

This section of the hike is called the Flower Garden.  So lovely!

Hiking over a glacier...no big deal!

There was no snow like this last year.  Shows you how long and lame our winter was this year!

Is there anything more beautiful than this?!

One good thing about all the snow is that the waterfalls were amazing!

We're almost there!!

 12pm: Made it back to the car!  A 12 hour hike on little to no sleep...15 miles later...so worth it!

We did it!!  So sore and ready for a shower!

Toward the end of the hike, I really started thinking that it was never going to end...ever!  I was very ready to be done!  My toes hurt so dang bad.  I could barely function the rest of the day on Saturday, but I was feeling pretty good on Sunday.  Thanks to Heather and Olivia for joining me on this crazy adventure!  It was super fun and actually ended up being perfect.  The temperature was cool most of the trip.  We didn't run into any wildlife.  We didn't slide off the mountain side on a glacier...a couple of spots were quite precarious!  We had good food!  What a great day...night...whatever it was!  It was awesome!  Until next summer, Timp...when I conquer you again!

13.1

 Last Saturday was a big day in the life of me.  It was Park City half marathon day! With the encouragement of my roommate, Olivia, I decided to run a half marathon back in March/April.  I wanted to see how my surgery/recovery went before registering for one.  I healed faster than anyone would have ever thought from my surgery, and registered for the Park City half marathon the end of June.  I had been running pretty regularly before my surgery, but after the surgery, I was on a mission!  The last few weeks before the race, Olivia and I were running around 20 miles a week.  I was very ready for this race to come and to conquer it!  Here are some pics of us before the race all ready to go!

Heather is never one to pass up a race, so I knew I could count her in.  She ran with me several times in the evenings during our training.  This was her third half marathon.  She's such a rock star!!

Olivia and I saw many, many sunrises and sunsets together training for this bad boy!!  This day was no different.  We left home at 5:30am to head up to Park City.  The race started at 6:30am for the full marathon runners and at 6:45am and 6:50am for the half marathon runners.  I went ahead and put myself in the last wave.  My motto has always been "slow and steady finishes the race."  I'm not out there to break world records, just to do my best.  During training, I would usually average about 10 minute miles, so my goal for the half marathon was 2 hours and 15 minutes or less.  I was pretty nervous when we started.  It's just my competitive nature to want to do awesome.
The race started in the Newpark area just east of Kimball Junction and wound around the condos for about the first mile.  Then the rest of the race was on paved and unpaved trails up to the barn that's about halfway between Kimball Junction and Park City.  Then it looped back around to where we started.  It was gradual uphill the first 7ish miles, and then downhill the whole second half.
I felt really great the whole way.  My knees and hips would hurt off and on, but nothing that I couldn't handle.  It went better than I could have ever expected!

Here I am at the finish line.  My official time was 2:11:38.  I met my original goal!  I feel pretty dang good about that time!

When I crossed the finish line, the first person I saw was Amy.  I didn't know they were coming up to Park City, so it was a huge surprise.  I got a little misty for a minute.  It meant so much to me to have Amy, Deeds, and Jack there to support me on my big race day!  Thanks team!!

Here are some pictures of Heather, Olivia, and I at the finish line.  This was Olivia's second half marathon and she beat her previous time by 7 minutes.  Way to ROCK it, O-town!!

We got these artsy fartsy medals when we finished the race.  It makes me laugh a little, but I will take it!  And I will also hang it in the living room proudly!

After we got home, I showered and got ready for the day.  Then Deeds called me and wanted to go golfing.  So I backed up my 13.1 mile morning run with 9 holes of golf!  It was my first time ever playing real golf.  Deeds coached me.  I have a long way to go before I'm any sort of good.  I hit three balls into the river. :)  I might just take up another several hundred dollar hobby soon and buy myself a set of clubs!  What a great Saturday!