Delray Beach — Patti Part Two

I’ve been so busy having fun here in Florida I haven’t had time to blog - but going to start correcting that right now! The main reason that brought us to Florida was to run in the A1A Marathon/Half Marathon - so we have been busy getting prepared for that - in addition to enjoying the beautiful area and weather. Running this race has been a goal of Kristen because her parents have been coming to the Delray Beach area since she was a little girl, so it’s a second home to her. Her parents purchased a beautiful condo in Delray Beach a number of years ago, and it’s literally right on the beach. So how lucky that she invited Deidre, Harriett and I to join her and we jumped at the chance.

Delray Beach is straight up A1A from Fort Lauderdale. It takes about 30 minutes depending on traffic - which is usually terrible but always pretty. If you continue going north on A1A it winds along the ocean and takes you up through more beautiful beach towns including Palm Beach - very swanky! That’s as far north as we drove and the homes along the way are enormous massive estates with spectacular landscaping and the ocean as their backyard. We had our own personal guide because Kristen knows the area like the back of her hand - so all of our meals were wonderful!

Two great places for breakfast/brunch. The first was in the adorable downtown Delray Beach called Boheme Bistro.

Latte’s all around and Brie Omelets - Yumm!

The second brunch was at Dune Deck in the beach town of Lantana - just a little north of Delray Beach and literally right on the ocean. One of Kristen’s favorite spots and we can all understand why. It’s pretty large but was packed. Our timing was great because we only had to wait a few minutes for a table. Then a tough decision as to what to order.

I picked the veggie omelet and the other ladies all went with the cinnamon raisin french toast. My omelet was great but I couldn’t help but have meal envy when the french toast appeared.

We ate dinner one night at a fun spot in Lantana called The Old Key Lime House. We sat outside at a great table right on the water but it was so dark I didn’t get any pictures. I had delicious grilled fish taco’s and of course key lime pie! We also went to an Italian place in Delray Beach the night before the race to carb load but I can’t remember the name - sorry!!

On Friday afternoon we headed down to the Fort Lauderdale Convention Center to pick up our race packets and visit the Expo. The Expo was excellent! Lots of great snacks and drinks to sample and cool running gear to purchase.

I checked and my name was on the big board so it was official - I HAD to run!!

We did our last training run on Saturday morning - just 3 miles since the day before you don’t want to wear out your legs.

Wearing our Team W3 shirts for good luck!! Harriett, Deidre, me and Kristen. Lucky to call these ladies friends and fellow runners.

Sunday was all about the race. We had to be up at 3 AM. That was kind of rough but we had to leave at 4 AM so that we could get to the start, park and be ready to run at 6 AM. Because of the heat and humidity the race started really early and we didn’t want to be stressing about being late. We made it with no problems and were ready to go. Full disclosure - I was running the half but the other 3 were doing the full. Everyone did awesome and felt good about what they had accomplished.

Definitely the award for most unique and creative medal!!!

When we got back to the condo we had a great surprise. Kristen’s awesome neighbors Cindy and Kiv had left us two bottles of wine chilling with a congratulations note - how great is that??!!

And you can bet we opened one immediately!! Thanks Cindy and Kiv!!!

We continued the celebration by heading to the beach. Of all the things we did in Delray we were all in agreement that being on the beach was the best part. We were able to relax and enjoy the weather and pick up some cool shells to bring home to remind us of the fun we had.

Kristen pointed out to us what to avoid on the beach. The Portuguese man o’war!! In fact the beach club next to the condo flies a special flag when there are more then usual to watch out for, and we saw some when we were there.

That’s no plastic bag - it’s the man o’war!!!

We got up early to watch the sunrise on our last morning there. Compared to getting up at 3 AM it was easy - and totally worth it!

Thanks for hosting us Kristen!! We had a fantastic perfect time! I dropped the ladies at the airport and headed across Alligator Alley to spend a few days on the gulf side exploring Naples and Marco island. Check back in for that!!