When I had about two weeks left in this last semester of grad school, I decided I deserved a nice, relaxing vacation to reward myself for the last 2.5 years of blood, sweat and tears that it took to get my MBA (with a 4.0 GPA, I might add).

So, I found a silly cheap deal on CheapCaribbean and booked immediately.

And then last Sunday, I hopped on a couple airplanes and parked myself on the beach until last night.



It was glorious and perfect timing since DC got hit with a polar vortex while I was gone. (Stepping off the airplane last night back in DC was a brutal reality check).

I'd never been to the Dominican Republic before, and I will say, I didn't see very much of the country on this trip. In fact, I never left the all-inclusive resort where I was staying. Unlike my other international trips this year, this trip was never really about the sightseeing.



It was only about sitting on the beach in the 80-degree weather in the sun, reading some books, going kayaking and sipping some fruity drinks.

Oh yes, and I also fit in a trip to the resort spa for a much-needed, de-stressing massage.

It was just what I needed after an especially long semester and a really long 2.5 years of grad school work.

And now that I'm back in DC, I've got about a week of work left until Christmas vacation when I get to start planning how I'm going to train for my first post-grad school marathon (I got into Chicago whoo!) and half marathon (RnR DC in March!).