Tobacco Road Marathon: The Race-cation

This North Carolina marathon location was excellent for a full vacation along with the race!  Christian and I left Missouri on Thursday, May 13 and returned on Tuesday, May 18, and we crammed about a month's worth of adventures into that time!

I'm including a few of our best photos, but our entire trip photo documentary is here.  She and I made very good travel buddies and I'm thankful God connected us through running.

May 13:

• Left Springfield at 2:30 p.m. CST.
• Arrived in Raleigh after a short layover in Charlotte at 8:30 p.m. (7:30 p.m. CST), and picked up our rental car.
• Checked into our hotel, an Extended Stay America in the Research Triangle Park area that was cheap, clean, and safe.
• Ended up with a little tour the Research Triangle Park area and Downtown Durham due to Apple maps initially taking us to a very incorrect location of the restaurant we ordered take-out from, The Goat.
• Ate while watching House Hunters and crashed!

May 14:

• Woke up and took our time getting out for a shake out run around the Research Triangle Park area, then ate breakfast in our hotel (and Christian got coffee at The Goat).
• Explored downtown Cary, which was very cozy, clean, and artsy.
• Picked up our race packets at In and Out Sports.
• Had lunch at an Asian-inspired restaurant right by packet pick up.
• Explored the American Tobacco Campus area.
• Bought groceries at Food Lion and made dinner in our hotel room before an early bedtime.

Downtown Cary

Burt's Bees on the American Tobacco Campus

May 15:

• Marathon morning!
• I woke up at 3:30 a.m. to eat breakfast, and we left for the race a few minutes before 5:00 a.m.
• Race parking and everything else went smoothly, and you can read all the race details and more here.
• We had brunch at La Farm right after the race.
• After showering and a little rest at our hotel, we headed to Downtown Durham.
• We explored Downtown Durham on rental scooters and on foot.
• We did a historic comedy bus tour of Durham, which was hilarious even though we were the only people on the bus who were sober.
• We had take-out Ramen for dinner (Christian's pre-race favorite) and another early bedtime.
• I slept about 3 hours due to post-race insomnia, but anything more than 0 after a marathon is somewhat winning for me!

Downtown Durham has a Central Park

May 16:

• Half Marathon morning!
• Another early wake up, for Christian to eat and I'd been awake for awhile (I slept from about 11 p.m. to 2 a.m.).
• Everything went smoothly with getting to and warming up for her race as well, and I thoroughly enjoyed cheering for her and other friends!
• We had brunch at Fount with 3 additional friends who ran the half.
• We explored downtown Raleigh on foot, which is also very artsy.
• We did an escape room at Tower Escapes, which was a historic tower building made into escape rooms.  We didn't think this one through very well because we were both exhausted and failed hard at solving the puzzle!
• We had late lunch/early dinner at Morgan Street food hall.
• We tried to get into a "secret" bar, but the green light wasn't on and we must not have been cool enough when we asked about it.
• We had ice cream from Two Roosters Creamery.

Girls' brunch

Note to self: don't do an escape room the day after
a marathon again

Famous Two Roosters

May 17:

• Christian slept for 13 hours!  I was up at 5 a.m., and ended up writing my race recap, going for a short shake-out run, showering including shaving my legs, eating breakfast, and taking an hour nap before she woke up, hah!
• We drove to Wrightsville beach, about 2 hours away.
• We explored the beach, the pier, and the surrounding area.  We both got a little sunburned.  We had lunch at Adapt.
• We toured the Raleigh Rose Garden while it was sprinkling.
• We had cocktails/wine downtown Raleigh, then planned our 2021 fall races while buzzed.  I was so affected by 1 glass of wine I signed up for a 5k, bahaha!

Beach trip!

I wasn't brave enough to walk around in my swimming suit

Raleigh Rose Garden

May 18:

• We started the day with a hike at William B. Umstead State Park.
• We ate breakfast in our hotel, packed up, and checked out.
• We went to the science museum and history museum in downtown Raleigh.
• We ate lunch at Transfer Food Hall.
• We headed to the airport, dropped off our rental car, and headed back to Missouri.  We had a 30 minute layover in Chicago, so had to pretty much run across the airport to make our connection, but we did and landed in Springfield around 9 p.m.

Hiking at William B. Umstead State Park

Raleigh Science Museum

The only thing better than traveling to a race is traveling to a race + vacation!  I can't wait to do it again!