Gymbo, the Re-Boot

Let's not beat around the bush; the last eight years have been up-and-down for me on my fitness journey. For starters, eight years ago today, I closed on Casa Meg, and started the (Wild and Absolutely True) process of making it livable. Since July 28, 2016, I have:

1. Had the craziness of buying my first home. My running took a big hit as I got used to a new neighborhood.
2. A year later, the craziness of my mom's cancer diagnosis, and the following months of supporting her.
3. A year after that, Mom passed away, starting off about a year that is mostly kind of a blur. Grief is weird. 
4. Just as I started to come back to some semblance of normal, BOOM! A pandemic.
5. Let's face it, the whole of the year 2020.

Things have more or less leveled out since then, but with all the wild life changes, other things suffered. 

I worked out with Kay for a while, online, but an eight-hour time difference and his own life stuff have made that harder and harder. If I've learned anything, I need a coach in my corner, and while Kay is happy to cheer me on in our WhatsApp conversations, it's not the same as having people in person who are glad to see you walk into the gym. 

Add to all of this the fact that 24 Hour Fitness, never the fanciest gym, has gone very, very downhill, and I have struggled to be the gymbo I once was. I have two clubs that are convenient to me:

• The Antelope club, pretty much right across the street from my condo complex, but very understaffed--only two personal trainers, very little desk staff. People do not re-rack their weights, do not clean equipment after use, and a person can walk into the gym and not have one person look at or speak to them the entire time. Look, I don't need a parade for showing up at the gym, but a greeting at the door is nice?
• The Fulton/Hurley club, within a mile of my school and perfect for days I have to stay for a school event and such. Also understaffed, never clean, and equipment constantly not broken. The leg press machine was out of order for a month. Toilets regularly out of order. Dirty locker room (I once found a used tampon in a shower stall). 

With the dirtiness, broken equipment, and dude bros never picking up after themselves, I just find 24 Hour to be an absolutely depressing place to go. I thought about buying some training again to motivate myself, but the only gym with enough trainers to really choose from is about five miles out of my way.

But I miss working out! I have some equipment here at home, but not enough to make big growth and gains. Something needed changing.

I did a simple search for local gyms on the Maps app on my phone. One that came up is a small, privately-owned gym about five miles from here, in Roseville. It's easy to get to (minimal traffic, on a couple of small back roads). And for $100 a month, I have unlimited classes and free gym time. 

So a few weeks ago, I drove over one morning to check it out, and met the owner, Fred. He was very welcoming and I explained that I'm really just looking for a place where I feel welcome, that is clean, well-maintained. I immediately got the sense that this is exactly what he wants for his gym members. He walked me through a basic workout, and immediately said, "Ahh, you know what you're doing!" 

I do know what I'm doing. But I also really like walking in and seeing familiar faces (I've already started recognizing some faces, and the place is never crowded), and getting a cheerful greeting. I can ask Fred for help adjusting a machine, or a spot on the chest press, and he is totally happy to assist. But he's also happy to let me do what I feel I need to do.

So far, I've mostly attended the classes, and only done one self-guided workout on a morning he was out of town (members can access the gym, and there's almost always someone there). The classes are great--full-body workouts, at your own pace, with plenty of variations. Can't do a Bulgarian Split Squat? Do regular lunges instead. 

Last week, chatting with him before I left, I said to Fred, "I'm actually jazzed to come here." I'm not bullshitting him. The place is well-maintained, has every type of equipment you could need, and he keeps ample bottles of cleaner and rags around--and people USE them. He has a water cooler, keeps a box of tissue, a cup full of hair ties. It's the little things, along with the upkeep of the place, that make it so easy to work out there. 

Even better, like I mentioned, I've already met a few people who come to certain classes that we are on a know-your-name basis, and we can encourage each other. One is another Antelope resident who is also a music teacher! 

In a few short weeks, I've been seeing some steady gains in the weights I'm lifting. I'm feeling great, and I'm enjoying the workouts, which take me anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour. This coming week I'm going back in to school, so I'll be switching to the evening classes--some run by Fred, others by another trainer who is also really great. 

The best part is I know I'll make the switch from morning back to evening workouts just fine, because I've started building a community that will encourage me, and not let me give up on my goals. How great is that? 

The Land Down Under, Part 13: Coming Home

 If you've ready any or all of the posts about this trip, you have a pretty good idea that this was absolutely a dream come true, and worth every penny, every tear, every minute of travel--even the long flight home.

I had found that the most convenient flight (there were cheaper ones, but they involved several hours layover in Asia and up to 25 hours of travel time) in my price range happened to be direct. United has a Sydney-to-San Francisco flight, clocking in at almost 13 hours. Considering I've flown to Europe on 11 and 12 hour flights before, this isn't terrible. 

I had to get up early to be at the airport on time, and I had hemmed and hawed about how to get there. Call for a taxi, or take the very convenient train?

In the end, the train won. The station is literally 600 feet (my phone said so) from the hotel, and while it was slightly uphill, it was not taxing. I still had money on my Opal Card, and this trip would pretty much finish that off. And a taxi would be four to five times the price. 

The train takes about 20-25 minutes to get to the International terminal, so it was an easy ride.

Of course, by the time I got to the airport, got checked in and through security (which was very efficient), my lack of breakfast and coffee was starting to show. With plenty of time before my flight, I found the nearest café and sorted myself out. 

The blue tail is my flight.

After eating, I did a bit of shopping, just to make sure any last-minute gifts were attained, and to get a fresh bottle of water for the flight. 

Didn't need these.

I spent some time walking, because I wasn't tired, and I knew I had a lot of sitting ahead. But time moved pretty quickly and before I knew it, it was time to board.

I had an aisle seat in the very back, next to a young-ish Aussie guy. We had no middle seat in that row, so it was nice in that respect. We chatted a bit--we're both musicians, turns out--and both of us were keen to get a picture out the window as we flew away from Sydney. You can see the Harbour Bridge and the Opera House, the buildings of Downtown, and all the way out to Bondi Beach (upper left-ish). 

What a beautiful, amazing place. 

As we reached altitude, I watched a movie, then eleven available episodes of "Abbott Elementary" (my poor seatmate was giving me some side-eye every time I let out an inadvertent, loud, "HA!!"). There were a couple of larger meals and a midflight snack. 

I didn't sleep at all, because my body on Sydney time figured it was just a full day. The flight left Sydney at 10:00 AM, so when I landed in San Francisco, my brain figured it was about 11:00 PM on Wednesday, thirteen hours later.

But in San Francisco, it was now 7:00 AM. I was basically starting Wednesday over. And I was getting sleepy. 

Wild.

And landing in San Francisco is "I'm home...ish," not a definitive, "I'm home!" (One does need to go through Customs, baggage claim, walk to the Air Train, ride it all the way to the long-term parking, haul stuff to one's car, load up, find one's way to the freeway, and then drive about two-and-a-half hours back to Sacramento.) 

Complicating things was our pilot's announcement as we approached the terminal. "Ladies and gentlemen, I've just been told that there was a power outage in the airport, and we cannot deplane until they give us the go-ahead. I'm so sorry. Hang tight."

A few minutes later: "Okay, ladies and gentlemen, I'm being told that the power is back on, they just have to wait for all the computers to boot back up." 

My Aussie seatmate and I got chatting with one of the flight attendants, and after about twenty minutes, we were all clear. It took a while to get off, of course, seeing as how we were at the very back, but no worries.

Customs was a bit mad--the power going out threw things into a bit of disarray, but to their credit, they were scurrying to open more booths and get us all moving through. I got through in under ten minutes. I had been hoping to answer the "where are you returning from" with a cheeky, "I come from the land down under!" but seeing the stress around me, I opted to just keep things simple. 

Baggage claim was another bit of chaos. Another flight, this one from Brisbane, was unloaded on the same claim carousel, and many of the people on that flight were not yet there to claim their luggage. Meanwhile, our Sydney luggage was waiting to be sent up, but they couldn't with the carousel still full. A group of very harried airport employees were hauling suitcases off to the side, and calling out as loud as they could, "If you just arrived from Sydney, these are NOT your bags! Those are next!" 

I felt for them. 

Finally, my suitcase was spit out, and I grabbed it and beat a hasty retreat. The Brisbane bags were still unclaimed, and the airport employees were still looking harried. 

All that was left was to make my way to the long-term garage, where I'd left Sylvie the 3 on the top level, straight out from the elevators. She was a bit dusty from being left uncovered for a week and a half, but otherwise ready to get me home. 

Only one wild thing happened on my way up I-80, but it was quite wild, indeed.

I reached a slow-down, as construction had narrowed the freeway from five lanes to four. We were all hitting the brakes, but not too hard, just your normal gotta-slow-here thing. I was in the second lane from the right when I heard the unmistakable sound of brakes...from a long-haul truck. With two trailers. 

Coming in hot...very near my car.

He did not hit me (you'd have heard about that by now, obviously). But he wasn't all that far from me as the brakes screamed and he slid sideways and slammed, hard, into a cliff (the road is cut through the hills, he didn't go over a cliff) on the side of the road. 

Meanwhile, as this was happening in the span of about five seconds, my phone rang, and my dad popped up as the caller. I answered automatically and said, "Hi, can I call you back? I need to call 911. OH AND I'M TOTALLY OKAY, IT'S NOT ME!!"

"WHAT?!"

"IT'S NOT FOR ME!!"

"Okay, call me back."

Traffic had never actually stopped ahead of me, so by now I was quite a bit ahead of the accident, and I could see a bunch of people pulling over to assist. There wasn't much for me to do at this point but keep driving so as not to cause an accident of my own. I took a few deep breaths, and called Dad back.

"ARE YOU OKAY?"

"I'm fine. Here's what happened..."

Dad had seen my text that I was leaving the airport, and called when he got back from his morning Veteran's Group coffee. Obviously, his timing was impeccable. 

You can imagine how lovely it was to reach my little condo. I hauled my things upstairs and locked the door. 

Being...me, I had thought I might use the time between arriving home and going to bed at the normal time to do some chores around the house, but jet-lag waits for no one, and the 17-hour time difference reared its head. I showered, passed out for a few hours on the couch, had dinner, and went to bed. Cleaning and laundry could wait.

Since I've been back, a couple of people have asked me, "What was the best part?" My automatic reply is, "The kangaroos!" And indeed, the kangaroo sanctuary was hands-down one of the best experiences of this trip, and of many trips I've taken. But I can't ignore Sydney--it's truly a lovely city. It is clean, pedestrian-friendly, entertaining, welcoming. There's plenty to see and do, great restaurants, beautiful walks, gardens, and excellent public transportation. I enjoyed it very much, and I will most definitely make a point of going back. 

The Land Down Under, Part 12: A Sunny Last Day

 Alas, all good things must end. 

Tuesday was sunny and absolutely gorgeous...and my last full day in Sydney. Wednesday morning would find me up early, making my way to the airport. But Tuesday was mine to do whatever I pleased. 

What I pleased was to allow myself a slow start in my hotel room before setting off to The Rocks and The Tea Cosy, where I had eaten a week prior. A second visit was absolutely warranted, though it was quite windy this time and I would need to sit inside.

After a late breakfast, I had no idea what I would do next...but as I made my way over to The Rocks, I passed one of those hop-on/hop-off bus tours, and grabbed a brochure.

If you recall from Part 2 or 3 of this series, I had a gorgeous meal at The Tea Cosy on my first full day in Sydney. I sat outside that morning, but today, as mentioned above, inside was necessary. Of course, the inside is just as charming as the patio. 

I had the same meal as the last time: two gorgeous scones with lemon curd and clotted cream, and the curried egg salad sandwiches. This would tide me over for many hours. 

As seems to be a pattern in Australia, a bird (a pigeon this time) wandered in to beg for food, but at least this one stayed on the floor and largely ignored me. 

While enjoying a leisurely tea time, I contemplated my options for the day, and decided the bus tour was just what I needed. I had been walking a lot every day--anywhere from 12 to 15 thousand steps, that I figured a couple hours of sitting would be nice. The weather meant I could sit on the open second story of the bus, and the recorded history would be interesting.

I walked over to the main boarding point and bought my ticket.

"Is this your first day in Sydney?" asked the bus driver.

"No, my last."

"Isn't this something you'd want to do at the beginning of the trip?!"

"Oh, probably." I answered with a smile. He looked at me like I'm a bit strange, and I took my ticket and set off upstairs. 

I rode the whole route of the bus, opting to not get off for anything. There are some museums and places in Sydney I didn't get to on this trip, but instead of regretting that, I figure I'll go back in a couple years, see those, and then visit another part of Australia. 

Of course, most of my pictures are just pictures of buildings I found interesting. 

Hyde Park Barracks

The largest garden building in the world, apparently.

Darling Harbour

Those are people, yes.

The bus reached the starting point, so I got off and walked over to the Circular Quay. 

I got a mocha, and since this was the day to do what I wanted when I wanted, I sat on a bench and enjoyed the views of the bridge, and some people-watching. 

I took some pictures of the Opera House, and a couple of selfies because it was so beautiful out, and my last day. Then I called Sarah for a chat about how wonderful the trip had been.

I put my phone in panoramic mode and got an absolutely fantastic picture, which is now in a frame and ready to be displayed.

Walking back over towards The Rocks, I saw this plaque, and thought it summed up my feelings perfectly. 

While talking to Sarah, I had asked if the Stitch tumbler I'd seen at Starbucks would be appreciated by the Stitch-loving Julia, and got a resounding YES in response. So I stopped to buy it. (It was, indeed, loved.)

I had one last wander around The Rocks, even paying one more visit to Sticky to buy the Ninja Turtles mix I'd seen them make part of the week before. 

I was getting hungry, and needed to get to packing and getting to bed early, so I found a spot for dinner and enjoyed one more sunset as it kissed the buildings of downtown Sydney.

Gnocchi--I think pumpkin? I can't remember now.

So it was back to the Tank Stream, to pack and shower, then get to bed early enough that my 5:30 wake-up call wouldn't be too difficult. On this last day, I had done some shopping, and found some lovely items to take home.

Gorgeous scarf

Very pretty dress in bamboo fabric.

A hoodie

Kangaroo earrings, which have already been worn
more than once.

All good things must come to an end, and my long-awaited, kerfluffle-and-all trip is one of those things. 

One more post--the coming home.