New Challenges, new goals, new heights

In previous blogs, I talked about doing the indoor ironman at work, which was a great motivator for me to work out on a regular basis. Since finishing that in February, Cassandra has been asking me what my next goal would be, and until this past Sunday I kept giving her the clearly indecisive answer of "I don't know."
Now it wasn't that I didn't want to have a goal, but lots of things that I thought would be a good motivator would just fizzle out and I would lose interest in a matter of days. This was tough for me because when I was younger I trained for some bike rides, (two time finisher of the Tour de Cure: A Ride for Diabetes right here), but I wasn't really feeling like doing bike rides again (keep it up AJ, I look forward to hearing about how your riding is going), I really don't like running so setting a goal of completing a long distance run didn't interest me, I think that triathletes are a little crazy (I just want to congratulate Miller on closing in on completing your first tri...and I am sure that you can read about it here, but you'll have to wait until next week) and just working out in the wellness center was getting a little stale.
So this last weekend, Rudy and I went for a hike because it was an amazing day and we had no reason not to. While on this hike I had my "Aha" moment that helped me decide what I my next goal will be, I want to backpack down the Grand Canyon camp out for a few nights and hike back out.

Now some of you might be wondering why I chose this as my next goal, and I have lots of reasons why:

1. I have never been to Arizona and therefore never seen the Grand Canyon.
2. In college, Cassandra and I took a backpacking class, and I have always wanted to do more of it, but I made excuses (I know, I know I am always the one telling others to "Make plays and not excuses.") for not getting in to it more.
3. Since graduating college, I have realized that I have become more stagnant then I should, and because of that I have slowing been gaining weight.
4. I want to lose this weight that I have gained over the last couple of years (ok, it has really been since high school, closing in on 7 years now).
5. I just want to be more healthy (I was already working on this and have currently lost 6 pounds).
6. I live in an area where training for this hike is good because cause of all the bluffs around me.
7. Since I've start to work full time, I found that I am "losing" my camping ideals...meaning I remember not too long ago when I was content just looking up at the stars, staring at a camp fire, or just going hiking, I found that I keep staying inside watching TV or facebooking or anything else. Basically making excuses to keep myself inside. And I've missed the outdoors.

I am sure that there are other reasons that I've missed but as you can see there are lots of good reasons why this will be a great motivation for me to be active again.

Since this is not a goal I can achieve over night, I am planning on taking my trek either in the fall of 2011 or spring of 2012. Why so long you might be asking? First I need to get in shape, second I am going to need some equipment, third I am going to need to save up some money in order to make it down to Arizona. Since this is a very large goal, I will be setting some smaller more easily attainable goals that will help me get to Arizona, I'll keep you posted on those once I figure out what they are.

I know that I won't be able to do this journey along, my good friend, Andy Miller who has an awesome goal of seeing all of the National Parks in the US has also never been to the Grand Canyon has already agreed to do this with me. I will also need prayers and encouragement from all the readers of "From the River" please check in with me once in a while to see where I am on things. Also, for those of you who live in Arizona, or have already hiked the Grand Canyon, or know a lot about buying backpacking equipment, or know of a good way to train for this hike, I am all ears and I welcome your advice. If some of you are interested in joining Andy and I please let me know.

I can't wait to smell a rose like this first hand.

Stay Classy!