Rave Runs, Beer Fest, Family Visits

Where to start? I've been a little out of the loop on social media and the blog for the last week or so, but I've had a fun time being super busy at work and traveling to Ohio to visit my family. For Memorial Day weekend, we headed up to SF for the SF Beer Festival and enjoyed a fun combo trail and road run while we were there. I love running the Golden Gate Bridge, plus we discovered new dirt to explore on the SF side via the Battery to Bluffs trail. The photos don't really do it justice, but I tried.

Looking back on the bridge. Hello, Karl the Fog. 

 Trail down to the beach. So many steps on this route.

Kev with the beautiful scenery and water view. 

Seriously, one of the most beautiful places to run in the Bay Area. 

After we turned around to go back toward the bridge, we discovered we had missed the Sand Ladder. Who doesn't want to climb the sand ladder? Of course, we did it. Between this and the beach we ran across, I emptied sand from my shoes two times during this run.

View from the bottom. Harder than it looks.

Attempting a run selfie up the sand ladder.

We ran the Golden Gate Bridge after we climbed back out of the beach area, completing an already awesome SF run. Not much makes me happier than running in SF or the Marin Headlands. 

After the run, we cleaned up and headed to the SF Beer Fest for the evening. In the grand scheme of beer festivals, this wasn't my favorite from an event perspective. I didn't really find any unique beers to try like I have at other events, except maybe the Saison brewed with Elderflower from Speakeasy. That said, there were definitely good things: the location was awesome, we hung out with friends, and they had food included in the price.

 So many corn dogs.

 Sophia and I with the view of Alcatraz.

 Impromptu SFM Ambassador meet-up with Sophia and Scott.

The obligatory beer festival selfie.

Now let's fast forward to this past weekend, which I spent in Ohio visiting family and friends. I took the red-eye out on Thursday and bumped the reservation to first class with miles so I could sleep better; this worked quite well. My friend Gia picked me up at the Pittsburgh airport on Friday morning so we could spend the day together before I headed to my parents' house. I miss seeing Gia! It was so nice to catch up and to see her part of the country.

Friday evening I arrived at my parents' house, where I found a cookout and my mom's awesome chocolate chip cookies. Yum. My parents love to cook - and are great at it - so I spent the weekend being spoiled. The time there was low key and relaxing; I enjoyed a couple of runs on the National Road Bikeway and hit my high school's track for a speed workout. I love the new track. When I was in school, we had a cinder track and not even enough hurdles to practice on a full set. Major improvements in the last few years.

I also had the chance to visit Kevin's family and to hang out with my adorable nephew for a a day. He's so freaking cute! And he's getting big so fast.

Hi Braxton!

I flew back to San Jose last night and now I'm getting back into the routine of work. But you know what's great about going back to work on Wednesday? It's almost Friday already. We have a friend coming into town for Alcatraz Sharkfest so it should be another fun weekend in the city. Bring it on!