Rain n Fun Lagoon, Barfberry
Friday we once again headed down to the gulf for another swim training session. It was not very enjoyable. This was the third time I had done it and all three times the water conditions have been rough. There also was a large sandbar off the coast and even with swimming 50 yards off the shoreline I was still hitting the bottom with my hands.
I also decided to stretch my distance, probably more than I should have. I think in total I swam a little more than 3/4 of a mile, of course that was broken into 10-12 stop/starts. The rough water took it’s toll on me. I took in a bunch of water again including one full force muggy where I was desperately breathing for air and instead got all water from a wave. It sucked.
Ali and Christy were concerned when they could hardly see me off in the distance. I emerged from the water totally spent. I was so delusional that I accepted a Corona Light that Christy kindly offered me, forgetting that Corona Light might be my least favorite beer on the planet. I just stood there trying to catch my breath for a long time. We headed out as the sky was looking very forbidding.
Ali and I had talked about heading to the water park on Sunday so I wanted to get anything around the house done on Saturday which I did. While Ali mowed I worked inside after doing various outside duties. While I was outside I took a picture of our very robust corn plants.
Saturday night we watched Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs. Wow, what a bizarre movie. I told Ali that whoever created this had to be on LSD or some sort of mind altering drug.
It was funny but just so damn silly. The best part by far for me was Steve the Monkey. I’d give it a B. It would probably be a great movie to watch drunk.
Sunday morning I blew off any brick training. I made the mistake of doing Romanian dead lifts on Friday and as a result my hamstrings felt like they were a couple inches short. Plus, I just didn’t feel like it.
Ali got up very early by Sunday standards and met Christy to run before going to spin class. While she was gone I got did whatever needed to get done yet. When Ali returned she was exhausted. We agreed she should lay down for a nap before we go to the waterpark.
Well while Ali was sleeping it started to pour, hard. By the time she got up we once again had standing water all around the property. The rain had stopped but the skies still looked very menacing. We came up with a game plan. We would dress for the waterpark and head there first. If it was open and it wasn’t pouring we would hang there for a bit. If it was closed we would just hit some stores that we needed to get stuff from.
Well when we pulled up we saw bodies up on the water slides. It wasn’t raining but you could see the line of rain very near by. We figured we rarely make the time to do something like go to the waterpark so we might as well give it a go. We figured if it does rain, we will already be wet.
The first thing we did was swim a few laps in the two 25 yard swimming lanes. I think in total I did 300 yards. That was plenty, I was panting pretty hard by the end of it. After the swimming we headed for the water slides. We did all of the 5 slides at least once, some more than once. It started to rain pretty steady while we were on the slides. The good thing was there was no lightning which would have closed the park. The rain didn’t seem to dampen the activity of the people that already paid their 10 bucks a head to be there.
The slides there are a bit annoying. The seams that connect the sections of fiberglass are too pronounced. When you are sliding down on your back you feel each and every one of them. Ali and I noticed on our trips up there was a much shorter line for the slides where you went down on your back and a much longer line for the inner tube slide. We saved the inner tube slide for last.
It becomes obvious why the inner tube slide has the most demand, it is the best one. Not only does riding on the inner tube eliminate the back pain from the seams, that slide is a particularly cool ride where a good portion is in total darkness. You emerge from the slide into the lazy river where you can enjoy a casual trip around the park.
The weather the entire time we were there was rainy and overcast but neither Ali or I cared, we had fun. After a few trips around the lazy river and walking around the grounds we dried off, changed and headed out. I really hope we can hit the park again while it was still warm and sunny before football season to make a day out of it instead of a couple hours.
After the park we stopped at Home Depot, Bed Bath & Beyond and Sports Authority. Sports Authority was the biggest stop of the three. I scored new lifting gloves, push up bars, an ab roller wheel, portable air pump (bike) and a second tri-style lycra suit. Exercise can be costly. Luckily Ali had a bunch of coupons along that saved us money at both B,B&B and Sports Authority.
On the way home we decided to utilized the $15 Coldstone gift card that had been collecting dust in our house forever. I thought I would try something different and get blueberry ice cream with crushed graham crackers and walnuts. It was in a word, gross.
I told Ali it tasted nothing like blueberry. Instead it just tasted like some sort of artificial flavor, sort of like ice cream bubblegum. Ali encouraged me to go back inside and tell them I didn’t like it but I declined. I picked it and since ice cream isn’t a real big deal for me I just left well enough alone. I ate maybe a third of it and left the rest to melt. Tip to Coldstone customers, avoid blueberry.
It continued to rain for most of the day. Our property had various lakes around it. The deafening chorus of happy frogs last night was incredible. It was so loud the dogs were hesitant to even head outside.