All systems go

I can hardly believe that my first post-Baby J half-marathon is in less than three weeks - I'm so excited!  We haven't had a decent break in almost eight months, so not only do I look forward to the race itself, but also to just getting away for a while and letting our hair down.  My dad and stepmom will be joining us on this trip to Namibia, plus the kids will, God willing, be meeting their great-grandma for the very first time - lots and lots to look forward to!

Meanwhile, my training is going really well and things are slowly but surely starting to fall into place for our trip.  I did my second-last long training run, a 10 miler, this weekend and it went great: No niggles, no pains - just a healthy sense of "oh, my goodness, 21.1 km is a long, long way!".  I was blessed with countless game sightings (waterbuck, springbuck, gemsbuck, jackal, duiker, blue wildebeest and ostrich) and returned home tired, starving and happy. 

Waterbuck.

Duiker.

10 miles done!

On a funny note, I met two very skittish ostrich males during the run (probably as a result of the culling season that just ended) - they just couldn't get away from me quick enough.  One of the ostriches, in his hurry to get away from me, tripped over a termite mound at full speed and crashed to the ground in a cloud of dust and feathers before getting up and racing away.  Poor thing - I felt so bad for him!

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I'm also thrilled (that's actually an understatement) to announce that J Bear's passport has finally been issued - hooray!  So apart from the tiny little detail of the daddy of all long runs (18 km) that needs to be conquered next Saturday, it's all systems go for the 27th!