The Slowest 6 Miles I've Ever Run: Brace Yourselves, Pictures are Coming.

This past Saturday was a GLORIOUS fall day.  Perfect in every way weather-wise and topped off by one of the best weddings I've ever been to in my life.  Since this wedding took place in my hometown of Ewing, NJ, I was fortunate enough to run with Ewing resident, running partner, and FiveHundredandTwelvePointNine blog staple:  sister Alison.  We started out early-ish for a Saturday, about 7:45am, where Alison picked me up from the hotel I was staying at for the nuptuals.  We got approximately three tenths of a mile down the road when we saw this: 

This picture is from Google Maps, I did NOT think that this overcast

 disgustingness was a perfect fall day.

That picture depicts a 4 lane busy road, an off-ramp, a complete lack of sidewalk, and way in the distance is a very large and foreboding hill.  NOPE NOPE NOPE.  We turned right around, got in the car, and and drove off to greener (and redder, and yellower, and oranger... you'll see in a minute) pastures. 

Take 2 of this run started at about 8, and this time we kept going.  The point of this post is that being outside is awesome.  Being outside in the heart of fall when the temperature is right and the leaves are changing is phenomenal.  About a mile in, we saw this tree:

Looks like it's on fiya.

Had to stop and take a picutre of course.  Then we realized that the entire street was really pretty and we should probably get some action shots:

Goooooo Al!

We were only about a mile and a half in by this point, mind you, and it's like 8:20.  So we kept running to pick up some time.  We then turn onto the canal path, and somehow ended up in what seemed to be Narnia, Terabithia, Middle-Earth, or maybe it was a serial killer's dreamland, who knows.  But this is it:

The Instagram filter was just too good to pass up for this one.

Goooooo CQ!

By this point we're REALLY losing time, so we put our camera phones away and make it a good three more miles before we pass this beauty:

Gate to the Marie H. Katzenbach School for the Deaf.  Would be a real shame

if it was a school for the blind, cuz that scene is gorgeous.

Picked me up a nice phone background, too.

Soon after leaving this lovely scene, we were running along, phones away, chatting it up, when suddenly Alison screamed, jumped, and made a horrifying face.  She nearly curb stomped a dead deer with her Mizuno.  (If you don't know what a "curb stomp" is, I do not suggest you look it up, horrifying images may be found).  Anywayyyy, since we were rapidly approaching 9am and NOT so rapidly approaching 6 miles, we took one last picture of a pretty awesome tree against the sky, picked up speed for the last mile, and finished at about 10 after 9 in the morning.  Said tree:



Glorious.

When all was said and done, it took us an hour and 25 minutes to complete a run that should've taken roughly 55 minutes.  But these pics are pretty sweet, and considering we ran 13.1 relatively fast miles last weekend, I'd say we still did good.

Please never leave us, fall,

CQ