Getting into the pool again

Despite having a short break last week, I took today off, mainly to meet up with my aunt for lunch at The Parson's Nose. My mum came along too. We had a pretty good lunch, steamed mussels, haddock and peas and blackberry and apple crumble with ice-cream for me, and an espresso to wrap it up. I took advantage of my day off in other ways, as I was really tired this week, I took the chance to have a real lie in, until 9 am, then I headed to the pool for a long overdue watery workout. I got there about 10 and swam about 12 or 14 lengths (wasn't counting). It was hard! Mostly to get my breathing right. After a while though, a group of school kids arrived so I had to either decide to leave the main section of the pool and go to a sectioned off lane (where even the slowest is too fast for me) or go to the diving pool, which is about 10m squared and 4-5m deep. It's used alternatively for diving and aquajogging. I swam around a few times but got fed up trying to breathe so tried some aquajogging, but I didn't bother with the belt. It was a great workout, and combined with swimming in the diving pool, I ended up spending 55 min in there (I took a 5 min break to stew in the sauna). I really enjoyed it as I was in the water with the great resistance it offers but no impact and yet I had my head out of the water. I think this might be a good way to workout through the rest of the winter and give my dodgy right hip and left foot a rest while maintaining my running fitness. A great workout with none of the cold and wind of winter, and despite the intensity, I found it really relaxing! Next time, though, I will use the belt, as I think it's really essential for maintaining good form. I think it will be an end to my frustration with watery workouts- I love water, but I really do suck at swimming.

After the workout, I was pretty hungry, as with the lie-in, I hadn't had breakfast. So I enjoyed my huge lunch! I had no appetite for dinner later in the day, I had a bit of ginger cake with yogurt and raspberries when I got peckish this evening:

I'm now enjoying some friday night wine while catching up on blogs etc.

Here are a few random eats from earlier in the week that I didn't post about:

Homemade muesli

Rolled oats, flaked almonds, dried blueberries, vostizza raisins and banana chips. Eaten with frozen raspberries and yogurt.

Ginger cake, baked in the oven with tinned peaches and frozen raspberries as a quick fire dessert, served with Green & Black's ice-cream that I battled through rain and gale to buy.

Have a great weekend! I intend to hit up the aqua jogging pool again, and hang in my new favourite coffee shop in Belfast: Espresso Elements. Sorry Starbucks, think my coffee addiction found its true soul mate:)