I took over 300 pictures yesterday! I promise not to share them ALL with you (lol), but I’ll give you a fun photo tour of my adventurous workout and low carb meals. 🙂
I am sore ALL OVER today. You’ll see why… haha, whew!
I have more photos for you too. Even I am shocked looking at them. It’s amazing how fast your body changes when you get SERIOUS and consistent with eating low carb and exercising!!
Five years, 50 pounds, lots of yo-yo’ing. Why in the world it took me SO long to get here, well – I could kick myself. Don’t do that, don’t be like me. Start today and really challenge yourself.
Wednesday’s Low Carb Food & Fitness
I started my day off with a healthy low carb high fat breakfast. It’s 1/2 cup pecans, 1/4 cup Daisy brand cottage cheese and 4 small diced strawberries. (5 net carbs and 85% healthy fats)
I got my work done early, charged up my Fitbit Charge HR, and prepared a big thermos of hot coffee – ready for adventure! 🙂
That’s my Contigo Travel Mug, and they are amazing! My coffee was STILL hot more than 5 hours later, after my hike -lol. Seriously cool!
On the way out of town I grabbed a Low Carb Thickburger from Hardee’s. I got it plain with cheese, and the lettuce wrap, which is zero carbs.
What really shocked me about that picture, besides how THIN I’m getting (!!!) is the lack of dimples (dimply cellulite) on my thighs…
I used to be so embarrassed to sit down because of those darned thigh dimples! 😐 Just losing weight (eating low carb) took care of those. Exercising is helping tone up my leg muscles, but it was just eating low carb that made my cellulite disappear!
Here’s a full body picture of me that I took yesterday morning.
We drove out to the middle of nowhere (the land of no cell signal lol) for an adventurous hike at a place hidden in the woods called Lost Creek Natural Area. It’s not a state park, no guided tour, just pure NATURE to explore!
Before we hit the trail, I had to pee. Go figure -lol.
Here in Tennessee we call that “pop a squat.” 🙂 And while I was doing just that, carefully avoiding poison oak and spiders, I noticed a dark spot in the woods. I went over to check it out, and discovered a cool little opening in the rocks:
Once you got through that little crack in the rocks, it really opened up!
We decided to hike down in it and explore…
It was pitch black inside, a steep wet rocky decline, but we could hear water coming from deep inside so we felt our way around to check it out.
The sound of running water was coming from this crack in the rocks deep down in the cave. I squeezed in there, careful with my footing, with only a small flashlight, and went as far as I could. It dropped off a good 40 feet to nothing!
It was pitch black in there, and a little bit creepy.
Have you ever seen The Descent?! haha Yeah. 😐 😯 lol…
Check out this short video I put on Instagram to get an idea what it was like. 🙂
That first little hidden cave was quite a workout, but next came the hike down to the falls… hiking up the side of the falls (a serious climb!) and then a second VERY large cave to explore… plus hiking back out (uphill!), lol. Wowsa! 🙂
It was hot, sweaty, and FUN! I was falling over in this picture, lol.
Nevermind the “armpit tits” 🙄 My fatty arms / underarms etc is something I am seriously working on right now. 😛
Next we hiked up to the top, which was a serious workout! Mud, wet leaves, a steep slippery incline – bugs and poison ivy and spiders and maybe even snakes too, lol.
This is where the sweat REALLY started. 🙂 You had to pick your footing carefully as many of the rocks were loose, and watch close what you grabbed to pull yourself up – so you don’t grab a snake, lol.
It was so worth it… 🙂 Wow…
The pictures truly do not do it justice.
Next we hiked over to the main cave, which was much larger and had seen more human traffic than the first one. It was a HUGE rocky cave with a wild breeze blowing through it, and cool little crystal clear water drops clinging to the walls.
This kind of terrain is a serious workout. Navigating the steep inclines, the rocks, stepping over logs and such works so many different muscle groups!
We get to the main cave, and before we go in… well, this is my face when Joe showed me what we had to hike UP to get back out. LOL. 😯 Ack!
Hiking OUT proved to be the most ambitious part of the adventure, haha. 😛
Right inside the cave, the temperature dropped dramatically. We stopped to cool off on the big cold rocks and take a break for a second. And um, enjoy the view. 🙂 haha
Like the first cave, this one was pitch black once you got past the opening – and HUGE inside! This is the Lost Creek Cave in Tennessee.
We had to climb over huge rocks, navigating with only a very small flashlight and feeling our way along the cold rock wall. With huge cave crickets, no less – lol.
This is where my thighs started to BURN with all the up, down & over. Wowsa!! 😛
And I still had the ambitious uphill climb (not hike, CLIMB) out of there, half of which took both hands and feet (and knees, lol).
Hot, sweaty, sticky, itchy, aching, happy and… HUNGRY! 🙂
Hiking & caving works up a serious appetite! 😛
I came home, showered off, and called in a Grilled Salmon Caesar Salad from Applebee’s, and picked it up at their Carside-to-Go service.
I had 1/2 cup of pecan halves as a snack later in the evening.
A very healthy day from start to finish! 🙂
Here’s my MyFitnessPal Food Diary for yesterday:
It was an adventurous day, tons of FUN, and I am so incredibly sore – lol. What a workout!! 🙂 That feels GOOD! I can’t wait to go back to Lost Creek and explore the large cave more – apparently there’s a waterfall deep inside the cave somewhere. In the pitch dark, of course. Fun. 🙂 I would also love to explore the first smaller cave more, with better lighting.
I’m pleased I finished off the day with a healthy salad. I was exhausted and famished, and truth: tempted to eat some SERIOUS carbs, lol.
Every day, every choice, is a huge victory.
I’m on a mission to become the happiest, healthiest version of myself. After five long years of struggling, yo-yo’ing with success and failure, and overcoming self-sabotage… I FINALLY feel like I’m over the hump. The biggest one anyway.
Change is hard. Even the most positive change feels uncomfortable, and unsettling. Every single meal has to be a deliberate choice. I still brush off the urge to binge, repeatedly. Every day I wake up and figure out some way to work my body. I’m trying to force myself to get comfortable in my new body.
But at least I’m having fun doing it. 🙂
Best,
Lynn Terry,
aka @LowCarbTraveler
p.s. You can subscribe by email below to get my Daily Food Diaries throughout the Low Carb Challenge sent straight to your inbox. That way you’ll never miss great (easy!) low carb meal ideas. 😉
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