The Window Seat: Sports & Recreation Archives

How many lists have you seen like this one, telling you what you absolutely MUST do before you die, get old, get married, or get a cold? Maybe 1,000. Or better yet, how many articles such as this one have you read, telling you that those other lists are crap? OK, so both have merit, I'll admit. Like many travel junkies, I have a list. Not to divulge too much, but it includes a Maltese adventure, Latvian beer, and an Antarctic sunrise. However, I agree that determining that there are certain things that one must do before the end is a bit strange. Diff'rent strokes, after all. One of my greatest travel memories is being seasick at night in the Galapagos, unable to find the horizon on which to steady my gaze. That's not really something that anyone would ask for or desire, nor was the nausea something I want to relive, but it was great, if only retrospectively.

Photo courtesy of IgoUgo member runarut

This weekend, tens of thousands of runners—and even more spectators—will take to the streets for the ING New York City Marathon. Commandeering most of the metropolis for eight-and-a-half hours, the runners will navigate a course that takes them through all five boroughs. For natives and newcomers alike, it can be a great way to see the city. In fact, one of our own will be lacing up her running shoes this weekend in what will be her first marathon. Be sure to wish her luck! Another Gnome employee, John Whitfield, is making a bid for the finish, too. Check out his blog and leave him some words of encouragement!

This time of year I’ve got the white stuff on the brain. No, no. Not the Hollywood starlet kind of white stuff—I mean snow, of course. And so I begin to convince (some might say coerce) my friends to take a big ski trip with me.

But in every group there are always a few non-skiers. These poor souls get dragged to the mountain year after year by ski bums who care more about the inches of fresh powder than the amenities. This ski season, to tempt my favorite non-skiing compatriots, I looked up the best on-the-mountain bars. These watering holes are destinations unto their own, affording unmatched alpine views and elixirs to keep you toasty, and all are accessible without skis.

Photo courtesy of IgoUgo member captain oddsocks.

I’m a little homesick this week. Not because I miss Momma's cookin’ or the familiarity of home but because Saturday marks a very important day in the lives of true Texans: Texas-OU Weekend.

The rivalry between the Longhorns and the Sooners runs deep. It’s a fairly strong hatred, really. Legend has it that way back in the day, the annual Texas-Oklahoma game brought together oil people from the two states. Back then, it was a nonconference game, but the fans still took their football seriously. Doing what billionaires do, these guys made what most would call pretty hefty bets – they put their oil wells on the line! Ah! The plot thickens! And so does the animosity between the two teams.

Some people are all work and no play, others are merely slackers holding down a day job to fund their fun. Others still work hard and play harder. Then, there is that nearly imperceptible minority that simply cannot bear to be separated from their coworkers for even the slightest passage of time and so engage in some sort of fun jaunt on the weekend with their various professional counterparts. The office outing can be a dreaded affair but not at IgoUgo. I don’t mind telling you that here we take our fun seriously, and we settle any in-house issues the old-fashioned way: with duels.

There's something about travel that imbues even those of us who always wear a seatbelt in the back of a cab and return our books to the library on time with a suddenly fearless sort of "now or never!" mentality that we'd never find present in ourselves at home. "Ah, when else am I going to swim with sharks / eat deep-fried grasshoppers / try skydiving?" we think to ourselves. "I'm on vacation! What can go wrong?"

Why, just last week, my boyfriend and I were cycling across a bridge in Banos, Ecuador, when a few men approached us with a rope and a harness and asked if we were interested in bungee jumping. I admit I just couldn't work up the nerve to voluntarily throw myself off a bridge---perhaps if the Macarena had been playing on a loop for the last six hours it would have been a different story---but Sean decided that bungee jumping in Ecuador was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. And with only a fleeting thought as to how safe it might be, this impromptu act of kamikaze craziness, he paid the ten bucks and stepped into the harness.

For a lot of people I know, one of the hardest parts of a vacation is just deciding where to go. After all, the world is a pretty big place. But a new fast growing trend is making the decision more difficult than ever – not only do you have to figure out where to go, but what to do when you get there. And once you have all that lined up, you even have to break a sweat. It sounds complicated, but millions of people are doing it. In fact, not so long ago, it was a challenge to get notoriously sedentary Americans off the couch and burning calories. All of a sudden, we can’t get them to stay home.

I’m talking about active, sports related travel, and for some reason people cannot get enough. In May I signed up to ride the annual Commerce Bank 5-Boro Bike Tour in New York City, a one-of-a-kind event that closes major Big Apple roadways like the FDR Drive and Brooklyn-Queens Expressway to traffic and allows bikers to enjoy these highways for one Sunday each year. I did the ride out of a sentimental urge to see my native New York from a perspective usually reserved for bumper-to-bumper drivers stuck in gridlock. Apparently I was not the only one who had the same idea: last year, the event, already the nation’s largest group bike ride, attracted about 30,000 people. This year, 42,000 showed up, a new record by a huge margin. They came from all over the country and as far away as Europe and Australia to ride a 45-mile route through the city that never sleeps.

For 28 years of my life, I never thought twice about Hawaii. When you grow up in Florida in a town like Panama City whose official motto is “The World’s Most Beautiful Beaches,” you don’t find yourself pining for a trip to the Aloha State. But a year ago, I moved to the Bay Area and I began to wonder if I had been missing out on one of life’s most essential experiences, like reading a book or, I don’t know, breathing air. You see, you’re not truly a San Franciscan until you 1) have a bay window 2) learn to rhapsodize about In-N-Out and 3) fall head over heels for Hawaii and talk about it exclusively in hyperbole.

I'm not a big hiker. To be honest, I'm not really a big exerciser. Sure, I drag myself to the gym every few days and walk 50 minutes roundtrip to and from work, but I only manage to do the former because it's in the lobby of my office building, and I certainly make up for the latter with supplementary trips to the candy bowl. (Supplementary to the candy I'm already eating, you understand. Because I need my strength with all that walking!)

And so this weekend when the mercury hit the high 70s in San Francisco and my boyfriend dragged me out of the house for some fresh air--some fresh hillside air--I wasn't too into it. Because although my single greatest achievement in life is the completion of a four-hour hike over the Great Wall of China in 90 degree heat and badly-fitting shoes, I only really did that by accident. (I thought we were going to a nice busy spot, where I could take a few pictures, wander around a little, and buy some postcards. I didn't know we'd be trekking from one remote spot to the other, with only a few hastily-made peanut butter sandwiches and a can of overpriced Pringles for sustenance.) In the end, the hike was fun, of course, but it was fun in the way that eating ten Snickers bars in a row is fun. Which is to say, I probably wouldn't want to do it again.

I swear this post is about the mountains, despite the apparent lack thereof in the picture. (If you squint really hard you can see them in the background I swear - but isn’t my dog cute?) Today is my one-year anniversary of having left my mountain town for the city, and while I have very few complaints about the relocation, I still desperately miss the mountains – particularly in the summertime. While the picture might not scream mountains, it reminds me of all the things I love about them in the warm weather months.

My college campus stood just a few miles from Ameriquest Field in Arlington, home of the Texas Rangers. “Dollar-dog night” was always a summer highlight, especially for a bunch of broke college kids looking for entertainment, food and beer -- all on the cheap. Just being at the stadium was always a treat as well. Aside from the ever-present energy that surges through stadiums during baseball season, many of America’s parks are architecturally stunning and historically riveting.

For me, baseball symbolizes a few things in particular: summer, college and friends. But, for many die-hard fans, it also represents a lofty travel goal: to visit each one of America’s stadiums.

Last time I stopped skiing long enough to type up some thoughts, I extolled the virtues of spring skiing, and gave four great reasons to get off the couch and hit the slopes in March and April this year: better weather, more snow, the choice of going where the best conditions are and lower prices.

But five is such a round number, and I realized I had left out another big advantage of spring in ski towns: it is when residents start to go stir crazy after a long winter and roll out the parties. In fact, almost all of the biggest festivals in ski country are held in the spring, often with big name entertainment, free activities, and general craziness that adds to the ski experience. It’s like après ski squared.

Skiing is universally considered a “Winter Sport,” but when it comes to ski vacations, the smart money is on spring, as in spring skiing. If you can only take one big trip a year, it can be hard to hold off until March or April when you watch the Weather Channel and see blizzards pounding the country, but as they say, patience is a virtue, and there are good reasons to skip over December, January and February. In fact, I can give you four excellent reasons to spend the cold winter months working out indoors in anticipation of your big trip.

As an east coaster transplanted in California, I didn't make it to Hawaii until my 31st birthday. Since then I've been nine times, including the trip I just returned from--celebrating my 34th on Kauai. Averaging about three visits a year, I can't seem to get enough. Plus, with tourism being the islands' biggest moneymaker, I rationalize that I'm doing my part to support their economy. Truthfully though, I just love it.

It was my first time in Kauai, and we didn't stop for six days straight.

A friend of mine is on the management team at one of California’s most beloved ski resorts. When I told him that I was going to write my blog post bemoaning the lack of snow in the mountains this winter, he howled at me not to jinx them any further. Indeed, East Coast resorts are reporting their bleakest season in 25 years, alpine resorts across Europe have cancelled hundreds of race events due to lack of snow, and West Coast resorts are being forced to advertise top-of-the-line snowmakers and groomers rather than the usual eye-popping base depths and abundant powder stashes. And with the ten-day forecast offering no glimmers of great white hope, folks whose income is dependent on the snow are understandably edgy. However, once I explained to my friend that my timing (or lack thereof) is such that the moment I write about the dearth of snow, it will dump like no tomorrow, he acquiesced. So I’m offering this one up for all of my snow-seeker friends out there.

Getting up at 2 a.m. on vacation sounds crazy, but what's even crazier is waking up at 2 a.m. to bike down a 10,000-foot volcano. At least that's what my friends say. My comeback is: how often do you get to watch the sun rise over a crater, then ride a bike 37 miles down to sea level and only have to pedal twice?

The Haleakala Sunrise Bike Ride was early, but it was also one of the most rewarding endeavors I've ever experienced on vacation. As we headed out in the pitch of night, we were groggy and a bit cold; however, once we arrived at sea level, my adrenaline kicked in. The tour guides mentioned the annual ride to the top of Haleakala, and I knew I was headed for my next challenge. (Apparently, Lance Armstrong climbed it a few times in one day for training.) The ride is officially named Cycle to the Sun (Haleakala means "House of the Sun"), though most locals call it "Psychos to the Sun" (Cycle to the Sun). Either way, climbing straight up for 40 miles is my idea of a vacation.

Am I off my rocker to think of vacations as adventures that take you out of your element? Or should vacation be about relaxing and recharging? You tell me!

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