Wow, where to start – what a day. First things first – the marathon is over and Sharon did really well. She looked strong at the end as she went across the finish line and says she is very pleased with the way she ran. We were both up well before the alarm clock and ready to go early. Sharon hooked up with some people we had met the previous night, and I headed off with Lindsay, Ruth, and Krista, who were there to pick me up promptly at 5am. After some navigation around all the street closures (due to the race), we were off to our first stop, a ‘suburb’ of Durban called Pinetown, I think. Even though it was still quite early, the place was jumping, with people starting to line the streets and settle in for what was clearly going to be an all day event. South Africans love to brii (barbeque) and even as early as it was, grills were going and the smell of barbecuing food was everywhere. There were grills of varying shapes and sizes but most were small, about the size of a large frying pan and fueled either by wood, charcoal or the occasional propane tank. We were able to see the first runners come through with a parade of advance motorcycles and media trucks (when I say media trucks, I mean what appeared to be flatbed trucks that had some type of bleachers built on the back for people to sit on – hope they had seat belts 
). We had coffee and rusks (which are like biscotti only better), as we waited.
Lindsay’s family is fourth generation South African so he was able to give me a lot of background and history of the area throughout the day, which I quite enjoyed. For the rest of the day, we went from venue to venue, along back roads and through small villages. The entire race was lined with people and it almost felt like a 56 mile street fair with music, dancing and the smell of barbecue every where we went. I have to say that equally exciting to the race, was the driving experience as we maneuvered around an amazing amount of traffic and people, most appearing to want to be at the same place at the same time. There were several situations, where I was expecting horns to honk or fists to start flying, but everyone was amazingly calm. Since we were moving around so much, we didn’t ‘brii’, but Ruth brought sandwiches and I have a new favorite – peanut butter and bacon… surprisingly good!
Towards early afternoon, we headed to Pietermaritzburg, the town where the marathon ended, and made our way to the finish line. As you can imagine, there were even more people with all kinds of food, music blaring (a lot of Black Eyed Peas and Beyonce, by the way), and general commotion. There was one computer in the International tent where we could track runners, so I was able to calculate about when to expect Sharon. She finally came through at 9 hours 20 minutes to much cheering and flag waving, beating her goal by ten minutes. Sadly, Ryan was not so fortunate, I’m sorry to say. While he ran strong most of the way, he had a pretty severe reaction to some medication he was taking for an old injury and was not able to finish. Very disappointing and a sad note to end a wonderful day, but fortunately he seemed to be feeling better when I checked in later in the evening. French fries and a bottle of champagne for dinner (Sharon’s pick ) and then off to bed.