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| A group of nasty old orcs! |
I continued my
(virtual) “Walk to Mordor” during the past week by logging eight miles since my
last update. I walked/jogged three miles on Sunday and five more today (Friday).
So far, I’ve logged 1,641 total miles on this virtual trip to Mount Doom, and
I’ve got 138 more miles to go before I reach Mordor. All in all, I’ve completed
about 92.2 percent of the total trip.
In relation to Frodo
Baggins’ overall journey to destroy the One Ring at Mount Doom in Mordor, I’m on
the 21st day of the trip past Rauros Falls, which is March 16 on the Middle
Earth calendar. I left off my last update on March 16 at Mile 1633, which was
where Frodo and Sam saw an orc hold on the west side of the path to Mount Doom.
Two miles later, at
Mile 1635, they hear orc scouts and hide behind a bush. As they listen, they
learn news of Gollum. The light begins to fade as they hide. Four miles later, at
Mile 1639, they continue in the dark along the eastern edge of the valley. I’ve
traveled two miles beyond this point, to Mile 1641, and the next significant milestone
comes 10 miles later, at Mile 1651, where they reach a stagnant pool, which
they can’t see in the dark.
For those of you
reading this for the first time, I began this “Walk to Mordor” fitness
challenge on Jan. 1, 2015. Using a book called “The Atlas of Middle-Earth” by
Karen Wynn Fonstad, fans of “The Lord of the Rings” created this challenge by
mapping out Frodo’s fictional trek to Mordor, calculating the total distance at
1,779 miles. They also used the original "Lord of the Rings" text to
outline the journey, so you can follow their route by keeping up with your
total mileage.
The folks who worked
out the nuts and bolts of this virtual journey have divided it into four parts.
It’s 458 miles from Hobbiton to Rivendell, 462 miles from Rivendell through
Moria to Lothlorien, 389 miles from Lothlorien down the Anduin to Rauros Falls
and 470 miles from Rauros to Mount Doom. (Those locations should sound very
familiar to “Lord of the Rings” fans.) The hobbits averaged 18 miles a day, but
if you walk (or jog, as I sometimes do) five miles a day, it’s possible to
cover 1,779 miles in a year.
If you’re interested in
learning more about the “Walk to Mordor Challenge,” I suggest you check out two
Web sites, http://www.nerdfitness.com/blog/2012/07/23/walking/
and http://home.insightbb.com/~eowynchallenge/.
Both of these sites provide a ton of details about the challenge, including how
to get started.
In the end, check back
next Friday for another update and to see how much closer I am to Mordor. I
hope to knock out at least 10 more miles next week, and I’ll include all that
in my update next week.
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