Steve's portable track

I just thought I'd report my runs from my personal running and training ship which also doubles as the Royal Caribbean "Voyager of the Seas" cruise ship. Believe it or not, there are actually a few wackos who like to work out while on vacation and I'm one of them.

The track on the "Voyager class" ships is impressive for a ship. It only takes 5 laps around to equal a mile. There are 2 lanes with a decent running surface. The only thing I didn't like about the track are the 2 sharp turns on the aft side - but since its on a cruise ship, I probably shouldn't be so picky.

I managed to log just over 10 miles on 3 short runs. The first run was done last Saturday at sea approaching the French Riviera. The winds were rough. On one side it was great as the wind propelled you down the lane, but on the other side - brutally tough upwind running! Because of that, I did the next 2 runs while the ship was anchored at Naples, Italy and the island Mallorca, Spain.

The first 2 pics show the view shortly after my Naples run. On one side, you can see the currently sleeping Mt. Vesuvius (peak on the right in photo). The other photo shows the other view of the city of Naples. Normally when I ran early, very few people were on the track (imagine that!).

The last 3 pics show the island of Mallorca. This is a beautiful island. It has nice beaches and mountains that are close to 5000 ft. Much of the high country is preserved and features beautiful trails for hiking, mountain biking, and horseback riding. Like Barcelona, this places is paradise for triathletes!

The run in Mallorca was done early, before sunrise. Dana took this nice shot while Maria and I were running. She joined me for about 1.5 miles of the 4 mile run this morning. Later in the day, the family did a 3.5 hour hike in the mountains. We covered about 5-6 miles with over 1000 ft of elevation gain on the way up and then a decent of around 1200 ft close to sea level. That's where we shot these last 2 pictures.