Vegan in Fredericksburg

Wow...  It's been over a year since I posted here.  I've been trying to eat healthier these days - and not always succeeding.  But I take it once food choice at a time, and try to make more good choices than bad.

Since my birthday fell on fourth of July weekend, we put off going out of town until this last weekend. Saturday we headed to Fredericksburg, a place not well known for it's healthy vegan options. However, for the most part, I managed to eat surprisingly well. We ended up snacking quite a bit, but I brought dried fruit and nuts with us to try to stay away from bad snacks.

For dinner Saturday night, we had salad, veggie sushi, and a giant (and way overpriced) stir-fry with a miso sauce that was light on oil. Sunday we grabbed lunch at Subway on our way to Enchanted Rock. I skipped the vinegar and oil I normally would have gotten, and had mustard instead - and of course, no chips or soda. I hiked all the way to the top of the rock - which might not seem like a long hike at only .6 miles to the summit, but it's also a 425 ft increase in altitude over that .6 miles. I'm not sure what the flat surface equivalent might be, but it's definitely got to multiply the effective distance hiked by some factor. The SO had a shoe blowout a little over halfway up, so he camped in a shady spot while I went on to the top.

After cleaning up, we went to dinner at Navajo Grill, and had one of the most wonderful meals I've had in a while (short of Wink, of course). The appetizer was a plate of beautiful local tomatoes with olives, basil, cucumber, and balsamic vinegar (no oil). I was in heaven! For our main course, the chef made us a plate that included a lovely pasta dish with fresh local vegetables in a light tomato sauce, spaghetti squash with sun dried tomatoes, and kale sauteed with white wine, lemon, and roasted garlic. It was light, healthy, and delicious. After dinner we went to see the bat emergence at the Old Tunnel, an abandoned railroad tunnel. If you've never seen a bat emergence, they are impressive. This tunnel is home to anywhere from one to three million bats during the summer months - and they all come out of the tunnel at dusk in search of food.

I wasn't perfect, and yes, I ate a few things that aren't on the acceptable list - but I did make more good choices than bad, and I worked exercise into the weekend. A vast improvement over times past, when I would have used being on a getaway trip as an excuse to eat horribly and be a slug.