Woohoo here comes the Spring, which not only announces Arnaud’s birthday (the fact that his date of birth matches the return of the sunny days is no coincidence according to him… I’ll let him believe that), but also that it’s time for our annual trip to Arizona and California! Since we graduated from NAU, we’ve been going back there for a few weeks of vacation/training camp every year around Easter time, and we always have a great time!

We landed in Las Vegas, so we decided we might as well start our trip spending one night there to soak in the sun, colors and ambiance of this crazy place (and also, stop by the Cheesecake Factory in the Caesars Palace to get our traditional Oreo Dream Extreme Cheesecake -the name is pretty accurate to the feeling you get eating it). The next day we started driving our way towards Flagstaff (about 4h drive), with a small stop just outside of Vegas to enjoy Lake Mead’s great views and beautiful cacti. Arnaud took advantage of the location to put in a nice tempo run on the trail next to the lake before climbing to the land without O2, while I was educating myself about the local wildlife and flora at the Visitor Center. We then resumed our way up to the mountains, making sure to tune into our favorite country channel. What we like about nowadays country songs is that the titles are always really straightforward, and the topics, accessible to anyone without trying to be too fancy (I mean, check these ones: Chicken Fried, Shut up and fish, drinkin’ problem, My church, I drive your truck, among others). It is also super catchy and will help you get through the really long hours driving, when the only order your navigation will give you is: “Turn left in 156 miles”.

Once in Flagstaff, we went straight to Caroline and Diego’s place (our friends from college), where we were staying, and directly resumed our favorite activities together while at NAU: having a nice dinner and playing some UNO. Our two weeks in Flagstaff flew by, between our workouts, playing around with Caroline and Diego’s dogs and cat, meeting some of our friends from all over the world that were also there on a training camp, and other Belgian waffles nights. On the weather side, Flagstaff did hold on to its reputation: lots of sunny days, massive amount of wind, beautiful skies, two random days of snow out of the blue, and three days in bed with the flu. We also had the chance to attend the NBA game between the Phoenix Suns to Oklahoma City with our friend and Blue Army teammate Peter Callahan, it was so much fun! To everyone’s surprise, the Suns beat OKC, although the only thing the crowd was cheering for was for Westbrook to make history by accomplishing yet another Triple Double… Which sadly he couldn’t achieve that night.

Just like that, it was already time to begin the second phase of our trip: one week in California (Los Angeles and San Diego) with our friend Fanny, a pro pole vaulter/doctor/pastry chef (in no particular order). We decided to stop again in Vegas for one night to split the long drive in two days. During the  Las Vegas-Los Angeles drive, we didn’t fail to stop at the inevitable Peggy Sue’s diner, lost in the middle of nowhere, to enjoy its outstanding decors and atmosphere. If you ever have the chance to pass by, make sure to stop for a good ol’ burger, one of their huge milkshakes, and hang by their gift shop full of tacky porcelain superhero figures (watch out though, as we’ve seen some clumsy friend a few years ago breaking a china batmobile and being forced to buy it, while we were hysterically laughing).

Our stay in LA definitely saw our sense of resourcefulness tested, between living and cooking in an apartment where the only kitchenware were 4 plates and 3 butter knives, a problem with the lock which got us stuck outside of the apartment for 1.5h without bags, water or wallets right at the time where we were suppose to depart for my race at Azusa, and Fanny’s poles lost by the airplane company and finally found back broken (thanks Lufthansa…Not). I guess it is how you make memories though! All in all, we had such a great time with all the running, hot tubs, walks in Newport Beach, and cookie dough bar. We then went out to spend two days in San Diego. This city has the best weather year round, and is definitely our favorite place of all times! We went on nice walks along the cliffs of La Jolla, the beautiful beaches and cute streets on the Coronado island (where Arnaud and I got engaged already 3 years ago -time sure flies!-), and in the gorgeous Balboa Park.

Well, I guess we can say these were three busy and great weeks! Making memories for a lifetime one trip at a time 🙂

Now we are finally back in Cincinnati, and seeing how colorful and cozy the Downtown is in the Spring, I would say it is pretty darn good too!

We hope everything is going great for you all ! Lots of love,

Agnès & Arnaud