Friday at the FRidge

Today our group went on, what is affectionately called, "Stop Sign Hike." Now, I had read about the Stop Sign hike in another blog months ago. It is a long and pretty grueling hike on a pavement path on a steady incline for the first 3 1/4 miles, and the last 3/4 mile is on a road, which is very steep. When you reach the Stop sign, you turn around and come back down. In the past, everyone here at the FRidge did Stop Sign on Mondays and Saturdays. Everyone timed themselves, and it was used as a "marker" for how well you had progressed over the week. The thought being that after working out in the classes all week long (and doing other hikes throughout the week) that your second Stop Sign hike would be faster.

Well, long story short, the FRidge no longer does Stop Sign 2 times a week. The park (a state park, I believe) was too overrun with people (there are 2 other spa/resorts here in this little town with hiking programs). So, I will have to wait until next week to see how far I've come on Stop Sign! As was expected, the views were amazing!

Here's the group starting out.

Apparently this area is an ancient collapsed volcano. 

The path winds up and through these amazing hills (mountains? rocks?)

Starting to ascend the last 3/4 mile hill. It may not look like much in the picture, 

but my calves were singing to me this morning!

The guard shack, and you can see the sign that indicates "stop sign ahead."

I made it! 1:45 was my time. 

This was the scenery I got to enjoy on the way down the hill. 

Look at the contrast. Amazing!

Since Stop Sign is a timed hike on pavement and not a guided hike through dirt trails and over rock fields, etc. the guides basically dropped us off at the bottom and said we had until 9:15 to go as far as we could go. So, I got up to the top in 1:45 (approximately. . . I forgot to set my stopwatch when I started walking) I was able to walk back about halfway down when it was time to get picked up. So, all in all, I walked about 6 miles today, mostly uphill!

Meanwhile, back at the resort. Today's menu:

Looks like a good food day! :)

That's strawberry sauce on the French Toast, and chicken-apple sausage.

Look at the size of that roll! Delicious, all of it.

The meatballs were turkey, I believe, and they were big! And, those are the 

best tasting sugar snap peas I have ever had!

The freshest, ripest strawberries on top of this pudding parfait. OMG, to die for! 

(My mouth is watering right now just looking at the picture!)

After dinner Matt Hoover spoke about what he learned at The Biggest Loser Ranch vs what he's learning at the FRidge. (FYI, he's learned more over his 2 week stay at the FRidge than during his 9 month stay at the Ranch.) 

Very inspirational talk. He left time for Q&A afterword. Great guy!

Today's classes were pretty mellow, in comparison to Monday's classes. I went to a demonstration about how to use free weights and why they are important. Very useful. And I had a pool class, H20 intervals, where we did a lot of lap swimming (the width of the pool, not the length). Mostly I was fighting others' wakes, trying not to lose my contacts in the pool, and trying not to drown. I am getting goggles this weekend!!

My after lunch classes were Disco Cardio Jam, Liquid Moves, and Circuit. Disco Cardio Jam was fun. It was a crazy kind of aerobics/dance class. You know I love to dance! I didn't quite get all the moves down, but I'll do better next week for sure!

Liquid Moves was basically moving around in the water and having fun. We played a modified basketball/soccer game first. And then we played water volleyball. That was really fun!

Circuit was just plain, hard, working-out stuff (going from cardio machines to lifting machines, and back and forth between the two for about 40 minutes).

After dinner and Matt's talk, people were just hanging out and chatting. Normally, I would go back to my room, change into my suit and sit in the hot tub for a little, but I could not bring myself to change back into my suit yet another time. So, I joined a group sitting outside and just chatted for a little while. Then Justin, our Concierge for the week, and I played catch for about 30 minutes. I figure I burned a few extra calories, instead of just sitting around. ;)

When I came around the corner towards my room, this is what I saw:

And with that. . . goodnight!
xoxo