Ahhh, vacation time!

I L.O.V.E. vacation time.  I don't love the work involved with vacation time though.  Let me rewind a tiny little bit. Every summer for my ennnnnnntire life, my family has rented a cottage in the exact same place at the exact same time.  I use the term cottage very loosely because although there are four exterior walls on this building, there aren't exactly full walls on the inside.  Nor are there bathrooms in any of the cottages or hot running water.  These cottages are not palatial by any means, in fact our tent is probably nicer.    However, within those four not-fully walled buildings, there have been a lot of happy memories.  It's the one place in the whole world that I can still vividly feel my mom's presence.

My husband, on the other hand, does not share my passion for this place.  He sees the bugs and the gap between the ceiling and the walls and the lack of running hot water and well, the bugs (mostly in the walk-to bathrooms that by all accounts are not very nice on the men's side!)

So, clearly without hot running water there's a lot of extra work involved come vacation time.  It means boiling water when you want to wash the million and one dishes that seem to invade the small counter every day because who wants to do dishes?  We're on vacation!  It also means a lot of walking because did I mention that there aren't any toilets in the cottages?  And while walking is good, walking in the wee hours of the morning because your bladder decided that it just had to wake you up to make you go pee simply because you can't take 15 steps and be at a toilet, is not so much fun.
It's at the cottage in the middle of the night when it's quiet and all of the other cottages are dark when I am convinced that every skunk in the world is about to walk in front of me firing squad styles, turn their big, bushy tails on me and let their stink fly!  Funnily enough, it's very rare that I actually come across a skunk in the wee hours of the morning so my fears are fairly unfounded!

Normally cottage time is a battle of good food versus getting enough exercise in to not come back weighing more than I left.  This year however, with the Richards vs Chicks competition, it's a little bit different.  We're all committed to not having badness in the cottage which is a step in the right direction.  I have a running schedule that I have to stick to in order to keep on track for my 15-k (which just in case you're keeping score I run in 2 weeks!)  If I can get some extra swimming and biking in there on top of my extra walking to and from the bathroom 50 times a day, I'll easily keep on track!
I'm going to try and take the scale with me so I can weigh in on Monday, but probably won't post until we're back!  I will attempt photos, but can't promise those will turn out in my wall-less cottage!

Stay tuned and wish me luck!