Early morning adventures: The jungle jog.

Firstly let me apologise for not writing since last year. Secondly I know the title sounds like another one of my stories, and it is, but this one is true. I have an adventure like this every time I can actually persuade myself to get up out of bed at 5 or 7 in the morning.

"Wake up Nadia." I hear my dad's voice somewhere in the distance.
"Do you want to go jogging?" I almost decline. But eventually:
"I want to, just give me half an hour to wake up."  Of course I don't say that but I'm thinking it.
So I decide to just react a tiny bit. I lift my head up once and nod, then fall back unto my tempting, fluffy, pillow.

Dad leaves the room and I try to stay awake. This is the hardest part. Getting out of bed. 
I swing my legs over the edge of my bed, I'm still lying down. I start to slip off the bed bit by bit. I feel like I'm melting into the floor. 

Finally I get up and feel at least half awake. Then I rush to get dressed. When I finally walk into the kitchen dad's ready to go. I grab a handful of raisins and a glass of water before rushing frantically after dad who's already out the door. 

When we leave the house I start my timer and ask (half cautiously): "Where are we going today?"
"Behind the lake"
"Oh."
So we set off jogging at a medium speed, at this time in the morning all I can see is fog and an absence of cars, also a couple of insane dogs who think it's amusing to follow us down the street. When we run past the lake club I spot a few people playing tennis but then we're past them. Nothing but fog now. Then we reach the point where we actually get behind the lake.

There's a type of swamp where we normally used to enter. Oh great these shoes are practically new! 
We decide to go on anyway. So as we're picking our way past the worst of the mud I hear a faint sound. It sounds like... wait it's gone now. Strange. We finally make it past the mini swamp and start jogging up a mega hill. Just our luck. So when we finally make it past the mega hill I nearly have a heart attack when a peacock jumps out from a bush and starts doing a jungle dance with three other peacocks. Just kidding. But I think they might be in league with the dogs. 
After jogging for about ten minutes in the calm, quiet forest I realise something. It's not really quiet here, it's full of animal sounds. Peacock calls, deer moving around, probably a snake or two rustling in the bush, and maybe even a porcupine or two. But it's quiet compared to the life in the city.
Of course this is part of the city, but it's got no angry drivers to honk their horns at you, no constant hum of traffic, no sound of cellphones and printers making the noises they make, no people constantly talking, and no TV constantly blaring, or radio blasting music all the time.
It's just nature. The way it should be...
Then I spot a little building. Sigh. Well it doesn't have to be perfect.
So by the time we decide to turn around I nearly panic because I'm so exhausted I'm not sure I can jog all the way back, and I'm in the middle of a forest! (Plus dad probably won't be able to carry me back.) But somehow I make it, and somewhere in the middle I run into a spider web.(Booo!)

When we get back I dissolve into the couch, thinking to myself: "I'm glad I went after all."

Noisy Nadia