Blend Retreat 2014: What Healthy Living Bloggers Eat on Vacation

So there’s this pretty generally accepted notion that if you’re on vacation, you can’t eat healthy.

While it’s definitely harder to watch what you eat – and much easier to overeat – when traveling, I don’t think it’s impossible to come back from a trip weighing the same you did when you left.

That being said, I ate a LOT this weekend at Blend Retreat. And my favorite part about eating with these ladies is that, before every meal, we ALL whip out our phones to take pictures of our food. Healthy living bloggers, you are so my people.

Anyway, I digress. I definitely ate a lot this weekend. But I also kept my booty movin’! I took 14,000 steps on Friday and 20,000 steps on Saturday..dang!

But this post is not about exercise. That post is forthcoming. This post is about not feeling guilty, it is about indulging (but not too much), and it is about balance. Balance, people!

I’m going going back back to… Utah?

Just a quick note to drop in and announce that…

I’m officially returning to Blend Retreat this year!

Thanks to a nice little tax refund from Uncle Sam, I can justify the cost of lodging & airfare (the cheap CHEAP price of $115 is MORE than reasonable for everything included in the weekend) to Park City.

Can’t wait to return to the Hyatt Escala where we had such a blast last year!

I met so many lovely ladies last year who all remain dear friends (and dedicated blog readers SLASH blogs that I still stalk read) today.

Click here to read about last year’s SWAG

Click here to read about last year’s FOOD

And click here to read about last year’s HIKE!

I can’t wait! If you have any questions about the retreat (it’s open to everyone, not just bloggers!), don’t hesitate to shoot me a comment or e-mail me!

Hope you’re all having a great week!

Are you coming to Blend Retreat?

Park City Hotel, Restaurant, & Bar Tips

After attending BLEND Retreat, one thing I promised to talk about that I haven’t quite gotten to yet is Park City itself. I’ve talked about all the food we ate, the exercise we did (OK, mostly the hike, since that was all I was up for!), and the swag we got.

But now I am here to tell you all about this little mountain town that attracts thousands of guests year after year! Albeit several weeks late…but better than never, right?

The only experience I had traveling to Utah was in 2010, when I had a layover in Salt Lake City with my parents. We missed our connecting flight [we were flying from Sacramento to New York] so we had 6 hours to kill at the airport. Naturally, we decided to go on a tour of Temple Square in Downtown SLC.

THE Mormon Temple

That’s another story for another day, but suffice it to say Mormonland is super interesting!

Park City, however, which is about 30 miles southeast of Salt Lake City, is a completely different beast.

Driving from SLC –> Park City

In 2002 when the Winter Olympics were held in Salt Lake City, lots of the events took place up in the nearby mountains. Check out these remnants! #olympicsnerd

Hyatt Escala Lodge at Park City

As I’ve mentioned, we stayed at the beautiful Hyatt Escala Lodge. It is one of quite a few hotel-resorts in the Canyon Resorts area of Park City – just a quick drive up the road from “Downtown” Park City.

we had to walk through several other hotels to get to our hiking trail – they all seemed lovely!

There are tons of ski lifts in this area, which I’m sure makes it a great place to visit in the winter months. We enjoyed walking to a beautiful hiking trail where we got this stunning view:

You can even see the resorts in the distance 🙂

The Hyatt itself was amazing. The grounds were beautiful, reminiscent of a big cabin in the mountains, but also very elegant and modern at the same time.

The restaurant in the hotel was the location of our breakfasts, and they also hosted our cocktail hour (complete with delicious appetizers!). It is a huge space with giant windows, letting in lots of light. Loved eating meals here!

Now…for the SUITE!

This is just the living room. And I totally slept on that couch (didn’t even need the pull out)…couldn’t believe how comfortable it was!

All four of us (Becky, Carly, Arlene and myself) kept saying the things in the kitchen were nicer than our own things at home. Because they WERE. Haha. It was such a nice place to just sit and relax during the few breaks we got throughout the weekend.

All in all, I can’t say enough good things about the Hyatt Escala. The service was also top notch…not to mention handsome, as pretty much every single lady in our group remarked throughout the weekend 😉

Main Street in Park City

There is one main street in Downtown Park City…and it is literally called Main Street.

It plays host to tons of shops, restaurants and bars. Even a dance club or two! Here are the spots I checked out:

Dining

On Saturday night, a group of us decided to go to Wasatch Brew Pub for dinner before going out on the town. I decided Saturday would be reserved for sampling some local beer! I got beer recommendations from one of the [many] handsome front desk guys at the Hyatt, and off we went to dinner.

I told said front desk guy that I like hoppy beers, and he told me I had to try Hop Rising by Squatters Beers. It’s a Double IPA [which means STRONG!] and I loved it. I’ve rarely met a Double IPA I didn’t like…I think many breweries take care to keep their double IPAs from getting too bitter and overpowering.

Paired with a black bean burger and sweet potato fries. Hilariously enough, most people at our table ordered this burger. It was super funny to me that we all ordered the same things [either this or the Avocado-bacon-chicken-lettuce-tomato & Swiss sandwich]…clearly we were all looking for the healthiest items on the menu!

the whole group! i believe this was stolen from Carly 🙂

All in all, it was a great dinner! Definitely recommend!

Going Out

While we were eating our gourmet dinner on Friday evening, our table was debating whether or not to go out for a drink or two. Debra brought up a great point: Who knows when we’ll be in Park City, Utah again…if ever? It was this “carpe diem” attitude that led me, Debra, Brittney [of The Laughing Cow], & Orlando [of Onnit] to go out after dinner on Friday night and see what Park City was like. We went to O’Shucks, a quirky little dive bar, followed by No Name Saloon, one of the more popular spots in town. On Saturday after dinner at Wasatch, most of our dinner group ended up repeating the same two bars that us 4 had been to the night before.

If you’re from out of town and planning on going out to bars in Park City, there are a few things I noticed that were different from most places I’ve encountered in California and elsewhere:

1. Liquor Laws: Beers on tap are capped at 4.0% alcohol. Unless they’re local, in which case they can be up to 5.0%. I don’t just say this because I want to drink the strongest beers to get drunk faster [although, yes, okay, sometimes I do]…Taste is definitely affected by alcohol content. There’s a reason why Bud Light is only like 4% alcohol. Stick with a bottled beer if you’re going for taste! Mixed drinks are also capped at exactly 1 ounce of liquor.
2. Closing Time: Bars stay open until 2am, but stop serving alcohol at 1am. I guess to give people a chance to sober up before heading home for the night?
3. Hipster-Bros: Park City is officially the Mecca of Hipster-Bros. Most of the guys we encountered there dressed like hipsters [e.g. they wore PLAID], but upon talking to them, we soon realized that they were totally just bro’s in disguise:

PLAID EVERYWHERE

On to the bars!

O’Shucks Bar & Grill

O’Shucks is for sure a dive bar by my standards. The drinks are cheap, there are peanut shells on the ground, and it’s small and cozy. The highlight for me was…cheap schooners!

After seeing them on Friday night, I had to come back and get one on Saturday. I had never had one before! I ordered an IPA, thinking I was totally scoring by getting a goblet of strong ass beer for only $7. Of course, this is before I knew about the aforementioned liquor law, and I basically ended up drinking a watered down version of IPA.

I’d say there was about 1.5-2 pints in the schooner. I decided not to finish it, because I wanted to save room in my tummy for some other [tastier] beers.

No Name Saloon & Grill

No Name is right next door to O’Shucks, and it’s basically a fancied up version of the same concept. We spent a lot of time here both Friday and Saturday nights, and I got the feeling it is a popular hangout amongst Park City dwellers.

They had a cool upstairs patio, which boasted great views and great people watching 🙂

I ended up playing Buck Hunter both nights:

I thought it was the super “Utah” thing to do, and apparently didn’t learn my lesson when I spent most of the game Friday night shooting cows instead of bucks 😉

On that note, I hope you travel to Park City some day! I had a great time, and loved getting to know my Blends better over great food and drinks!

Us at the SLC airport on Sunday – Carly, Brittney, Becky, Sara and I.

Have you been to Park City or Salt Lake City?

Have you ever arrived at a place where you’re surprised to learn their laws are different than your own?

Blend Retreat — The Hike!

So, our time in Park City for BLEND Retreat this weekend wasn’t only about food. Mostly food. But not only food 😉

(Funny story, I told my mom I wanted to show her pictures from Utah last night and I started showing her my previous blog post…halfway through, not realizing that the post had a theme, she goes, “Did you do anything but EAT?!” HAHA!)

There were also two Boot Camps scheduled for Saturday and Sunday mornings, hosted by GPP Fitness.

I heard it was great {and exhausting! They did the Deck of Cards workout in 7,000 ft altitude, whew}…but I didn’t go.

photo cred: Heather (Kiss My Broccoli)

You see, I got back to the hotel room around midnight after grabbing a drink {and playing some Buck Hunter, obvi} on Main Street in “downtown” Park City. I was all set to wake up at 6:45 and drowsily walk down to the ballroom where Boot Camp was taking place. However, my body decided to freak out and wake up once an hour, every hour, during my fitful 6-7 hours of sleep. I decided to let my body recover for a little bit so that I could definitely enjoy the rest of the weekend, and went for a short run instead.

Or…attempted to anyway. It was so rainy! I ran up and down a few hills and sets of stairs and got super winded, super quickly. Must have been the 7,000 foot elevation!

I’m so glad I let my body recover, because I was feeling quite a bit better after we had our Laughing Cow/Muesli Fusion Breakfast and it became time to go on our hike!

Check out all those girls gathered in the lobby ready to hike!

For those who didn’t want to participate in the hike, a Zumba class was held in the ballroom. I really wanted to try it, but I decided my belly was too full of bagels and muesli to jump and dance around!

The hike was sponsored by PROBAR, who provided us with their CORE energy bars and BOLT energy chews to get us through the hike. We all loved the energy chews, which had a good ingredient list and tasted like fruit snacks!

As for the hike, it started out a little shaky…

The mud on the road leading us to the trail was REALLY bad. You see, it drizzled on and off most of the weekend that we were in Park City, which created some pretty wet conditions. Quite a few people turned back after seeing how treacherous it was just to trek through the mud (I swear my feet weighed an extra 5 pounds!)…but I definitely already felt guilty for skipping the morning workout, so I trudged along.

And I’m so glad I did!

The trail itself wasn’t nearly as muddy.

And the views were spectacular!!!

There was even some snow on the ground still:

It was crazy to me that, even though there was still snow on the ground, everything looked so lush and spring-like.

Hi Ashley and Becky!

Eventually we made it to the top, and of course gathered to take pictures.

Me, Carly @ Snack Therapy, & Becky @ Olives n’ Wine {photo cred: Becky}

photo cred: Ian from Muesli Fusion {their first Instagram pic!}

I loved how everyone’s workout gear was always so bright throughout the weekend. I am all.about wearing obnoxiously bright clothing to work out!

Back down we went!

By the time we got back to the Canyons Resort area, the clouds had lightened up a little bit and I realized my face was actually a bit sunburned. WTF? Although, am I really surprised?

The trail itself was supposed to be about 3 miles, but here’s how long it ended up being total, including our muddy little jaunt to the trail:

Check out that elevation!

I’m very glad I decided to stick with the hike, because history repeated itself on Sunday morning…I missed Boot Camp again.

I know, I know. I went to a healthy living blogger retreat and didn’t go to EITHER of the workouts.

Let’s just say on Saturday night, we got plenty of ab exercise by how much we laughed! But that’s a story for another post 🙂

Stay tuned for more about all the SWAG we got (you think all these sponsored meals sound awesome? Wait until you see our SWAG BAGs!) and some stories and tips from the Canyons Resort area and Main Street in Park City! I’ve also been busy incorporating all the swag into some recipes (Muesli Fusion/Silk/Bobs Red Mill overnight oats, anyone?), so I should have a recipe for some protein muffins to share by the end of the week! I mean they definitely gave us enough.

My giant container of protein bars, and bag full of protein powders!

Where is your favorite spot to hike?

Do you ever talk yourself out of workouts? How do you know when to convince yourself to stick it out, and when to give your body a rest?

Blend Retreat – The FOOD!

Hi everyone! If you follow me on Twitter or Instagram, you probably saw a lot of this this weekend:

I spent the weekend in BEAUTIFUL Park City, Utah attending Blend Retreat. I expect to dedicate quite a few posts this and next week to recapping the event and sharing what I learned about all the great sponsors {and my fellow bloggers!}, but today I wanted to focus on one aspect I think you all will love: the FOOD!

The retreat included several hosted meals between Friday and Sunday: a Cocktail Hour and Dinner on Friday, and breakfast on Saturday and Sunday mornings. There were also a few Snack Breaks throughout the weekend, which consisted of some of the event’s sponsors setting out goodies for us to sample. All the food was great {not to mention healthy!}, and I was super excited to learn a lot about some new-to-me brands!

FRIDAY

Snack Break sponsored by Justin’s Nut Butter & Attune Foods

After Carly and I arrived in Salt Lake City, we met up with Becky, who drove us to the Hyatt Escala Lodge. Soon after checking in {and freaking out at how much SWAG we got!} we headed to the first Snack Break of the weekend.

I was pretty hungry at this point, haha, and had about 20 million graham crackers and entirely too much nut butter. Justin’s was sampling their regular and maple almond butters, regular and honey peanut butters, and chocolate hazelnut butter to spread on Erewhon graham crackers. My favorite combo was definitely graham crackers + honey peanut butter, but I know from experience that the maple almond butter is good enough to eat from a spoon!

photo cred: Becky at Olives n’ Wine

Becky, Carly and me!

Cocktail Hour sponsored by Silk

Next up, we all changed out of our travel clothes and into some nicer ‘duds.

The hotel put out a pretty amazing spread of appetizers, including crudites with ranch or cilantro-lime dressing, AMAAAZING spring rolls with Thai peanut sauce, and spicy black bean cakes. If I didn’t know that we had a dinner immediately following, I totally would have just eaten this as dinner! It was all delicious.

photo cred: Carly at Snack Therapy

The only picture I think I have of me dressed up, oops! Carly and I traveled from Sacramento together, and can I just say that I couldn’t have asked for a better travel buddy? It takes a special person to keep things light and entertaining when you’re flying home from a fun weekend on like 2 hours of sleep 😉

ANYWAY, back to cocktail hour! The restaurant at the Hyatt Escala Lodge is pretty gorgeous.

On the Cocktail menu were three specialty Silkology drinks, all featuring Silk Almond Milk. Being a ginger lover, I of course went for the Ginger Refresher: rum, ginger liqueur, almond milk, bitters, agave & mint. It was one of the most interesting cocktails I’ve ever had, that’s for sure! But it all somehow seemed to work.

There was also a photo booth!

photo cred: our 4th roomie, Arlene

Dinner + Dessert

Salads!

Entrees!

I ended up with (clockwise, from top): mixed greens with Chobani dressing, grilled veggies, Carrot Ginger soup, herb roasted chicken and fingerling potatoes, and a bulgur salad. And I later snuck a bite of Brittney’s quinoa cake, which was so. good.

I loved chatting over dinner with Debra from Miles to Run, and Gena who owns and operates Bake All the Things down in Southern California!

The dessert offerings were also pretty amazing:

Panna cotta featuring Chobani

Apple Cobbler

And.. Berry Tart! Which is what I went with 🙂

Obviously I couldn’t wait to dig in before taking a picture 😉

SATURDAY

Breakfast sponsored by The Laughing Cow and Muesli Fusion

On the menu for breakfast was delicious bagels and Smooth Sensations Cream Cheese Spread from The Laughing Cow. I loved the savory flavors – chive/onion and garden vegetables!

I went back to try a little bowl of muesli from Muesli Fusion and Silk almond milk. I had never tried muesli before and I may be hooked – it is basically granola without all the added sugar and fat!

Snack Break with Onnit Labs and Miss USA

Here are Orlando and Whitney of Onnit Labs sampling their nut butters and hemp protein products. They were serving up their walnut-almond-cashew trilogy butter and macadamia cacao cherry trilogy butter on rice cakes, and blending up chocolate hemp protein shakes!

Oh, and you may have noticed that Whitney also happens to be Miss United States 2012! I had a lot of time to get to know her this weekend at dinner on Friday and out on the town Saturday night and she is seriously the full package – healthy, happy, fit, and hilarious! Um and obviously she is gorgeous 😉 Can’t wait to check out her podcast Women Against Mediocrity.

SUNDAY

Breakfast sponsored by Chobani

Chobani was the sponsor of the entire retreat, so their products were sprinkled throughout most of our meals, but they got their moment to shine on Sunday morning!

In addition to fruit, they had a yogurt/granola/oatmeal station and pancakes made with Chobani in them.

The pancakes were so good! Greek yogurt really made them light and fluffy. I also was super excited to FINALLY be able to try Chobani Flip, but I accidentally left it in our hotel room’s fridge! D’oh.

There was also an Omelet Bar, which I attempted to wait in line for but gave up after 10 minutes of waiting. I just went back for more yogurt and fixin’s!

So as you can see, I definitely did not starve this weekend!

A super special thank you to Lindsay, Katie and Janetha for again hosting this great event. It was so lovely meeting you all in person, and you did a great job!

Stay tuned for more updates in the coming weeks, including details about all the cool companies at the retreat, all the fitness events {AKA a really beautiful hike}, and a post about where we stayed and what to do in Park City!

Have you ever been to a blogging conference, or another kind of professional retreat?

Did we meet at Blend?? Leave me a comment so we can stay in touch, and feel free to ‘borrow’ my photos!

Leaving on a Jet Plane – to Utah!

Hi everyone! If you’re reading this, I’m probably currently on a plane; either boarding, or sitting in one while it flies through the sky and I grip the armrest while praying it doesn’t fall out of the sky.

I love traveling, and am a weirdo who actually adores airports, but the act of flying actually makes me so nervous!

Regardless, it’s worth it for the result:

I’m on my way to Blend Retreat!

I’m quite excited, even though there are scattered thunderstorms on the horizon, because check out where we’re staying:

Pretty swanky, eh? A couple years ago, I spent the better part of a day hanging out in Salt Lake City on an extended layover, but I am pumped to travel a bit further east and check out a real mountain town! I’m hoping the altitude doesn’t kick my butt during one of the boot camps {or during the Cocktail hour, for that matter…}.

There are a ton of great sponsors and I’m really excited to learn more about ALL of them and try out new products! Here are just a few that I’m especially looking forward to:

{I’ve been wanting to add a protein supplement into my diet, but don’t know the first thing about them!}

{Silk is sponsoring the Cocktail Hour, and will be serving some of their their Silkology creations!}

{or as they’re called en France, La Vache Qui Rit!}

To get in on the fun, make sure you follow me on one of my too many social networking sites:

Instagram – @krhanzlik

Twitter – @_blondeambition

Facebook: Blonde Ambition

Be sure to check out my roomies Carly and Becky’s feeds as well!