Another Travel Day Eats Because All I Do is Travel

Date: February 12, 2017

Author: astottler

Greetings from New York! I will do a full recap of my New York trip soon, but I figured since I had basically a full day of eating from my travel day Thursday, we might as well start there.

Thursday morning began in Alabama, with a 3 mile run. Said run didn’t feel great, but a run is a run.

For breakfast, I had some Blueberry Chobani plus my bag of chocolate Cheerios that were packed form home almost a week prior. It’s been a long trip.

Last day in a suit!

I picked up a quick lunch at Subway before making the 1.5 hour drive to the Atlanta airport.

I ended up giving a new friend a ride to the airport (not a hitchhiker, I promise), and it was really nice to have some company and someone to talk to, especially since I was hermit-ing it up in Alabama my last couple of days there.

By the time I made it to the airport and rearranged my luggage, I was hungry again so I ate a granola bar while waiting in a very long security line.

At this point in my trip, I was SO tired of being on the road. I got really lucky with weather as a snowstorm was hitting the East Coast and had no delays, but I actually planned on just killing the last leg of my trip and heading home if that happened. Luckily, it didn’t, and I’m SO glad I made it out here.

I grabbed an airport salad and some chip-like things to eat on the plane on my flight from ATL->Philadelphia. Ironically, I was in Philly on the first leg of this long trip!

I knew I would want some type of dessert or snack, so I bagged up some Frosted Flakes from my hotel in Alabama.

I also had half a granola bar later on.

That’s all for now; I’m PRAYING I actually get home today given what could be poor weather. Otherwise (or maybe even so), I may get my last trip recap up while hanging out at the airport(s).

Not going to lie, I’m about ready for some CA sunshine!

Full Day of Eating as a Nomad

Date: February 8, 2017

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Hello from Alabama! Still. This is Day 7 on the road for me at this point, and I still have a ways to go. I was going to post tomorrow night, but figured I might as well capture a full day of eating as a nomad. I honestly didn’t do a ton today, but I’m still so reaching tired. Also, I can’t believe I’m in Alabama! I can’t say that’s somewhere I ever imagined being, much less liking. Also, the weather! Things learned on this trip: I have California blood in my veins. I thought I was going to die in Philadelphia, and upstate-NY isn’t looking too inviting.

I began my morning with a super quick sweat on the treadmill. I woke up for about an hour in the middle of the night and couldn’t fall back asleep, and stumbled on PB Runner’s treadmill workout. I figured, why not? I didn’t want that many miles so I only did half, but it was killer! I never ever ever do hill work on the treadmill and that basically killed me. All 5 minutes of it, haha! I was only on the treadmill for 15 minutes, before eagerly diving into breakfast. I wanted a change of pace from the hotel breakfast, so while killing time yesterday I stopped at GNC and picked up a mighty muffin and some berries at the grocery. YUM.

After getting ready for the day (okay, and watching some youtube videos), I headed downtown for coffee+actual work. Parking was IMPOSSIBLE. It took me forever to find a spot, but right before giving up I found one, with over 2 hours still left on the meter! A miracle! Especially given my limited number of quarters.

Naturally, I did my coffee research. I went to Prevail Union, and it was definitely a good choice.

This was a quality cappuccino. I spent an hour there researching and prepping for things tomorrow, before going to Pita Pit for lunch. I had a salad with veggies, hummus, and tzatziki sauce. I’m not sure why half my meals lately have been Greek, but it is what it is! I also had a few GF crackers from my stash.

Snack was the usual:

To be honest, I spent most of the afternoon debating about where to go for dinner. Such is life. I dropped back into Crossfit this evening as well. Everyone is seriously so great and welcoming. We worked on bench press, and then I slaughtered myself on double unders. Normally my double unders are decent, but I was borrowing a rope that ha a completely different feel from mine. I was getting 0-1 before whipping myself. Thankfully, this rope didn’t hurt as much as mine does, but I still left with tiger stripes!

I settled on a salad for dinner: gorgonzola, grapes, dried cranberries, artichoke heart, and chicken in sherry vinaigrette.

While walking around downtown earlier in the day, I picked up a cupcake from Gigi’s Cupcakes. It was a flour less triple chocolate torte. I knew it was going to make me feel like death, but look how pretty!

And yes, it did/does make me feel like death, but when you’re alone in Alabama you eat the dang cupcake.

That’s all she wrote. Until next time!

Reunion in Alabama

Date: February 7, 2017

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Well, if you’re keeping track, I’m now in Alabama! Places I’ve been in 2017: Kansas, Tennessee, Philadelphia, Alabama. I. Am. Beat. I’m also incredibly grateful for a break from the cold before I head back up north Thursday night. I have a randomly long time in Alabama because it made no sense to fly clear across the country home from Philadelphia and be there for all of 1 day and then fly back across the country. However, somehow I managed to convince my zoo friends to drive down from St. Louis to hang out in Auburn for a few days. One of them went to Auburn for undergrad, so she comes down occasionally to see her friends here.

Sunday morning I woke up in Philadelphia and hopped on the treadmill for a quick and early 3 miles. For breakfast, I made a flapjacked muffin that I brought, plus a carrot apple ginger lemon juice which I bought at Pure Fare the day before. I felt like I was coming down with a cold, so #health.

Getting a cab to the airport went seamlessly, so I ended up with plenty of time to kill at the airport. The flight to Atlanta was seamless, and it was lunchtime when I landed. I figured my best bet for lunch was at the airport, and I found a “Food Network Atlanta Kitchen” where I bought chicken and rice soup and some cracker type things.

The Atlanta airport was buzzing on Superbowl Sunday! And yes, I did carefully book my flight to arrive at my destination in time for the Super Bowl. I drove the 1.5 hours to Auburn, and upon checking into my hotel, finally met up with my friends. Can you believe it’s already been 3 months??

At this point in my journey, I was so emotionally and physically tired, and seeing them was just the best thing ever. I seriously almost started crying. And look what they brought me!

You cannot get this outside of St. Louis and it is amazing. I am SO excited!

We laid low for a bit before going to an early dinner at a Greek restaurant. I got lemon chicken soup and Greek salad.

Then, we picked up some drinks (I got Blue Moon) to take to a Superbowl party with my friend’s friend from Auburn. I wasn’t sure if this would still fall into Falcon’s territory, but it seemed like people around here were pretty evenly split between the Falcons and Patriots. I went in undecided; I thought the Falcons played so well in the playoffs, but I normally root for the Patriots (over any other team in general) because Tom Brady is from my hometown. As it turns out, my loyalty runs deeps and I found myself cheering for the Patriots from the start. Admittedly, when the Patriots got so far down I got distracted with other Super Bowl party activities, but I definitely watched the epic comeback. WOW. I actually didn’t catch overtime. The group wanted to head downtown, and we tried to make it by the time overtime started, but we were a few minutes short. Darn!

However, I did get to experience what is supposedly the biggest bar in the SEC.

It was a fun night!

Monday morning I woke up STARVING so I helped myself to hotel breakfast while my friends slept.

^grits <3

But was still hungry for second breakfast.

Honestly there’s not a ton to do here. We hung around before it was time for lunch. We went to a create your own personal pizza place, and it was so good! I got jerk chicken on GF crust.

After lunch we went to see a movie, Split. I thought it was decent but just got weird at the end. Funny it was set in Philly though! Looked familiar!

Check out this “art” in from of an art museum here:

For dinner, we went to a Mexican restaurant. I ordered chicken soup (it had avocado!) with rice, and it came with basically an entire chicken in there! Seriously, SO much meat. I didn’t get close to finishing it!

We spent the rest of the night hanging out and playing cards.

The next morning, sadly, everyone had to leave and head back to their lives back home! We had a quick breakfast beforehand.

So sad to see them go, but I’m so happy they came!

However, that left me 2 full days in Alabama by myself, haha. I spent the rest of the morning doing nothing/doing laundry before popping into Panera for lunch.

I found a natural foods store nearby that was basically exactly like Whole Foods, so I stopped in to restock some snacks. I also found the ginger chews I’ve been obsessed with lately, and they even had an apple flavor!! SO delicious.

In the afternoon, I wandered around a mall, read a book, and took a nap. I was going to try to drive around the area a bit more, but there was an emergency severe weather alert on the radio for thunderstorms and I didn’t want to be driving around in that, so I huddled in my hotel with a book and watched the storm unfurled outside.

In the evening, I dropped into a Crossfit. As it turns out, there is a Crossfit literally right next to my hotel. I was so shocked when I realized it was so close! Like, it basically shares the same parking lot. I braved the storm to walk the 200 feet to the box and felt so welcome! All Crossfits are so welcoming, but this one especially. We had a nice, long workout. It was 30 minutes of 1 minute per station: walking lunges, farmer’s carry, rowing, bear crawl, shuttle sprints. Plus some handstand practice. My handstands, while pretty terrible, are finally starting to feel stronger since my shoulder injury forever ago. It was nice to get moving again after a day off!

Because I’m boring, I went back to the Greek place for dinner and ordered a Greek salad with chicken.

The rest of this night consisted of typing up this post, and a date with a massive chocolate chip cookie I picked up in the Philly airport. I’m honestly still so exhausted, so I’m embracing the downtime!

I’mm check back in probably on Thursday with some more “food and fitness as a nomad” adventures!

Freezing in Philly

Date: February 4, 2017

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Hello from the East Coast! I’m checking in with you all as I end the my first leg of this three-pronged trip. I’m currently blogging from my hotel in Philadelphia! I’ve only been to this city once before, and it was for a college visit, and I was here extremely briefly (like a few hours).

Let’s take it back.

Thursday morning, I hit up the gym EARLY to sneak a workout in before my flight. I started the workout at 5:15am! I did 4 sets of 4 slow descent deadlifts at 155, and then did 4 sets of 6 single legged squats and RDLs. I finished with some weighted planks.

For breakfast, I made a protein smoothie with banana, milk, cocoa, and Quest protein. Of course with Cheerios.

^If you’re keeping track, I got back from Boston two days before leaving!

At the airport:

While waiting for my connecting flight to Phoenix, I noticed the flight leaving from the gate next to mine was going directly to Philadelphia!

I packed lunch to eat on my flight from Phoenix to Philly. To keep my food cold, I packed a bag of frozen peas.

I packed leftover butternut squash and sage egg bake with asparagus and GF crackers. The egg bake was leftover from the previous night’s breakfast for dinner:

This was PaleOMG’s recipe. We skipped the sausage, and added quatro formaggio cheese and spinach.

Plane snack:

When I landed, I knew it would be late and I didn’t want to go out after getting to my hotel, so I picked up Subway at the airport to go and ate dinner in my hotel.

I also pulled some carrot oatmeal cookies from the freezer before I left, and they thawed beautifully for dessert.

Not a bad view from my hotel!

Jet lag stinks, and I woke up early with very few hours of sleep under my belt. I packed a little bit of fruit since I knew it might be hard to find, so I had a tangerine with my breakfast bar.

Then it was time to brace the cold and take to the streets. Brrr.

I spent a lot of the day absolutely freezing. Unfortunately my clothing necessary for my activities was far from warm enough (flats….yeesh) and my toes were completely numb for a majority of the day. Seriously, I was concerned some of them would be lost. My feet were number for 4 hours and it was the absolute worst. I finally warmed up by the time I had to walk the 15 minutes back to the hotel, and it was brutal. I wore my flats through the city and was on the verge of tears by the time I finally reached my hotel, my because my feet were half numb/half in pain from the cold. I had grander dinner plans, but after changing into warmer clothes, I still did not want to go out. My hotel was attached to an Asian restaurant, and a big bowl of rice noodles sounded just about perfect.

After a few hours in a warm hotel room, it took some major rallying for me to brace the cold night air to walk the 10 minutes to Shake Shack. I put on every jacket I brought on the trip (3) with my scarf, gloves, ski socks, and boots. Shake Shack has the best frozen custard though. I got vanilla with fudge.

Saturday morning I dropped into a Crossfit class in University City. The temperatures were even colder than the previous day!

Feels like 15?? Yeesh. Again, I donned every jacket I had. Thankfully the sun made the temperature not feel terrible. At least the scenery was nice!

Of course, everyone was incredibly welcoming. The WOD was a 7 minute AMRAP of 5 front squats and 7 over the bar burpees. I finished 6+1.

After Crossfit, I went back to the hotel and got cleaned out before heading to Rittenhouse Square for lunch. I actually didn’t quite make it to my intended location before finding another cute looking cafe, Good Karma Cafe. Plus, it was nice and warm! I got sweet potato tortilla chips, a chicken sandwich with green goddess mayo and veggies on GF bread, and a GF chocolate chip cookie.

After lunch, I decided to check out the square!

Another note: I’m so impressed with the food in this city!

From there, I headed over to see the Liberty Bell. When in Philadelphia, right?

After that, I returned to Rittenhouse Square to meet an old blogger friend, Brittany, who used to blog at Freckled Nettles! We used to talk wayyy back in the early days of our respective blogs, and it was great to meet her in person! She was so sweet, and was able to tell me all about this city! Just another reason I love this community!

I was managing the cold pretty well throughout the day, but I wanted to be back in my hotel before the sun went down and the temperature dropped further. I picked up a sandwich (+carrot juice for tomorrow morning) at Pure Fare, and then went to a bagel place (random) across the street from my hotel to have some local beer. I’ve been trying local beer pretty much everywhere I’ve visited lately, so it was only fair!

The great thing about being in a college area is that it’s totally normal to sit alone!

I also had to stop at Wawa. I’m not sure how much of a thing Wawa is outside of Pennsylvania, but people here are very into it. I came to Pennsylvania for a college recruitment softball tournament back in high school, and we had some local players join my team for the week. They told us all about Wawa and TastyKakes, so of course for old time’s sake I had to go in.

Back in my room, I enjoyed a goat brie and fig sandwich (this was as amazing as it sounds) on GF bread with leftover chips from lunch.

And then ate a rice crispy treat I picked up from Wawa for dessert.

I feel like I should have found a more exciting dessert option given the abundance of amazing things here. The sad thing was Pure Fare had some amazing looking desserts, but they all had coconut oil. Darn coconut allergy!

Either way, it was a nice and cozy night, after a fun day exploring the city. Up next: Alabama!

I Should Have Done a Healthy Travel Series

Date: January 31, 2017

Author: astottler

Categories: Uncategorized

Another weekend, another cross-country trip.

I really should have turned all these weekend trips into some kind of “healthy travel” series. Seriously. This weekend’s destination? The Boston area.

Because I’m gone SO much, I’m really trying to fit workouts in where I can, and maintain healthy eating habits (because if I don’t I will not feel too good…).

My flight Saturday morning left at a very sane time, so I didn’t have to leave for the airport until 9am. There were no Crossfit/spin classes early enough, so I went to the gym to do my own thing. I actually really like these workouts. I actually love the no-cardio lifting workouts, where there is no time pressure and I just work on what needs work. Because I deadlifted at Crossfit the previous night, I did squat day. I want to spend more time focusing on my power lifts (squats, deadlifts, bench). We’ve been doing sets of 20 reps for squats at Crossfit, but only at 60-75%. I wanted to try to work a little heavier than that. I worked by way up to 165# for doubles, which is heavier than I’ve been lifting lately, but still not that great for me. I did 4 sets of 2 at 165. I need more time with some heavier weight on the bar, that’s for sure! Then I did some accessory arm work: 3 sets of 8 single arm press (while kneeling on a knee) with 25# and 10 tricep dips. I finished it all off with abs via a Blogilates video. Abs, another thing that has been neglected lately!

A side note: I think my body is starting to feel the 3 teaching spin classes a week because I feel like I’ve been WAY hungrier than normal. Friday night, right as Crossfit was starting I got hit with that intense hunger despite eating normally all day. Huh.

I made myself a quick protein smoothie+Cheerios post-workout. I always try to squeeze in nutrients where I can because you never know what you’re going to end up with! Smoothie: frozen cherries, milk, cocoa powder, chocolate protein powder. Current fav (plus we’re out of frozen bananas).

I always pack plenty of snacks for the trip. I packed lettuce+hummus+a hard boiled egg to eat on the plane, as well as a few leftover roasted carrots. I was going to have that with crackers, but ended up passing a place at the airport with lots of delicious looking vegetables, so I picked up so butternut squash and brussels sprouts salad.

We were lucky enough to get a nonstop (FINALLY), and arrived in Boston around 8:00pm. I’ve been anxiously monitoring the weather, and was happy to realize my 2 jackets from the plane were sufficient!

On the way to the hotel, we stopped at Panera, where I had my usual half Fuji Apple Chicken salad, plus some gluten free crackers that I brought.

We stayed at a Doubletree, as Doubletrees give you free, warm, delicious chocolate chip cookies. Sadly, I’m allergic to them (nuts) so I ate a granola bar in a sad attempt to replicate what I was smelling.

Sunday morning, my dad and I both started the day with a 3 mile treadmill run. After that, we headed to the hotel’s breakfast buffet, which was a nice one. I had a few bites of egg and potato, and then had Chobani yogurt with Cheerios and fruit.

Then, it was time to explore! The temperature was definitely manageable.

We stopped in the nearby town of Worcester. The pronunciation of that is so silly to be. Apparently about half of the letters are dropped!

We stopped at Wormtown Brewery to sample some local craft beer. We both tried Pumpkin Ale and Pilsner.

Afterward, we drove into Boston, to Quincy Market in search of Wicked Good cupcakes.

Lunch first though! There was tons of lobster and crab! I ended up getting lentil soup, a Greek salad, and rice pilaf. Sadly, it was far more food than expected so I didn’t finish most of the salad or rice.

Sadly, the cupcake place was out of gluten free. My dad tried a chocolate sea salt caramel cupcake though, and said it was pretty good.

Cupcakes in a jar—isn’t that fun?

Then, we were off on the streets of Boston.

We went to the Boston Tea Party ship and museum. I saw it on the map on the way in and it looked interesting.

We were all given feathers and backstories, and I thought my dad’s was hilarious:

We started with a “town meeting” for some historical background, and then went out to the ship to learn more and toss some “tea” into the water.

After, we headed into the museum to see some reenactment videos, more history, and part of one of the original tea boxes that was salvaged.

It was an interesting tour, and a fun way to kill an hour in Boston. Upon exiting, we found ourselves in the bakery/cafe, with the most amazing smell of chocolate chip cookies. Imagine my delight when I saw this:

Finally, what I had been craving all trip! I got some with tea (of course).

The sun was going down and the temperature was dropping, so we made the trek back to our hotel and had dinner at the restaurant there. I had a kale salad with roasted butternut squash, chickpeas, and chicken.

And then got to enjoy leftovers from my pack of cookies!

Monday morning hotel breakfast was similar: yogurt with cheerios and fruit, plus a bit of eggs.

Lunch was a catered Chipotle burrito bowl, with plenty of guac.

The best part of the day?

Obviously.

Finally, it was time to head for the airport. We grabbed some food to eat on the plane. I got a salad with goat cheese and some kombucha, and ate it with crackers.

Other plane snacks included a protein bar, smoked salmon jerky, cheerios, and an apple. When we arrived home around 10:30, my mom had some vegetable soup waiting for us.

But more importantly, she made a mini gooey butter cake! If you recall my St. Louis adventures, gooey butter cake is a St. Louis classic. She made a version with GF flour. This was a little different than what I had in St. Louis, a little less gooey and more custardy than sweet, but was still delicious!

And now my friends, it is back to temporary reality. I’m home for a whole 2 days, which includes teaching a spin class and taking a final, before I’m off on my last (albeit long) adventure! My final trip takes me to 3 eastern locations, and lasts 10 days. Stay tuned as I freeze my face off!