Relaxing and running!!!!

Friday night I left work at four, quickly got changed and headed out for a night with the girls.  I think Darren was particularly looking forward to his own little boys night in with a stop at the fish and chippery and then a whole evening of playing on his X-Box!

I met up with Diane and Gill at Flinders Street Station and then we went for dinner, sat outside in the sunshine at Federation Square - lovely!  It's been a couple of weeks since we got together so it was great to have an hour or so to catch up on where our lives were.  Diane and Gill went for an amazing seafood pizza with heads and eyes and shells and everything - looked impressive, but not for me!

We then walked to the Botanical Gardens and met up with Jayne, and made our way into the gardens to the Moonlight Cinema.  It was really busy but we found a spot for our picnic blankets.  It was odd because everyone was facing the same way but there was no screen!  Settled into our spot we got out the plastic champagne flutes and popped open a bottle of berry fizz!

As the sun was setting, from nowhere a big blow up screen appeared and the movie 'The Lovely Bones' began.  It was such a beautiful night with the gardens around us, huge fruit bats flying overhead, stars above, the city lit up in the background and a couple more bottles of wine!

Sunday was a little less relaxing!  Darren and I had entered the 'Run For The Kids'.  So, we were up at the crack of dawn, into our running gear and heading into the city on the train, along with many others participating in the 'fun' run for a kids charity.  Even though we had left plenty of time to get there, there was still a little panic while I joined the queue for ladies, and Darren dropped our bags off and we couldn't find each other again!  Just in time we managed to find each other, lose my sunglasses, find them again and join the masses heading through the start line!  The course was 14.4km and until that point the furthest Darren had run was 7km!  It was a beautiful sunny day, which also meant that it was really warm, and with very little shade you certainly felt every kilometre of the way!

The route won't mean anything to anyone, but I'm going to put it here anyway so that we can look back on it in the future!  The race starts at Kings Domain in Alexandra Avenue, right next to the Alexandra Gardens, heads over Swan Street Bridge, into Batman Avenue and through the Domain Tunnel. Coming off Bolte Bridge with its million dollar views, runners travel back into the city via Dockland along Waterfront Promenade and New Quay Promenade, a new feature of the course. Runners then turn right onto Harbour Esplanade then turn left into Collins Street, right Spencer Street and cross the river again, turn left into Yarra Promenade with Crown Entertainment Complex on one side and the Yarra on the other, then down St Kilda Road via Flinders Street, past the Arts Centre and finishing in Linlithgow Avenue.


It incorporates unique features that make it a landmark event and gives participants access to normally off-limit roads.

30,000 people ran, jogged and walked through the long and short courses (20,000 did ours - the long one!) and raised over $1 Million dollars for the Royal Children’s Hospital Good Friday Appeal.

Despite feeling very weary afterwards it was all worth it and great to be a part of such a big event for a good cause!  I'm very proud of Darren for running every step - next event half marathon?!