October 15, 2020

My Longest Walk in Probably 10 Years

First, let me just say that this was a really pointless goal. I have no idea WHY I made it a mission to walk every single street in a nearby neighborhood, but one day it just popped into my head and I've attempted it a few times. I felt like it should be easy. And then when I missed a couple of streets, I became determined to do it.

As I'm walking, it's so hard to remember what streets I already walked. My memory is bad as it is, but considering I've been walking that neighborhood every single day for a few months, it's hard to know if I remember seeing each street that day or a previous day. I didn't want to map it out ahead of time, because the whole point was to try to do it spontaneously.

I also didn't allow myself to turn around (for example, walk a short portion of a street and then turn around because I already did the rest of the street). This meant I had to circle blocks on several occasions just to make sure I walked one side of it. 

Each time I've attempted to do it, I've walked over six miles (the entire perimeter is roughly one mile). When Jerry got home this morning, I showed him my map from a couple of days ago, pointing out the couple of spots that I'd missed. He laughed and joked that I would always miss a tiny little portion of a street, even if I walked 10 miles.

I took it as a challenge, and decided that today was the day I was going to do it. I got dressed and ready to head out, and it started raining. I really didn't want to walk in the rain! So I looked at the forecast and it said that the rain would stop in 10 minutes. Good enough.

So, Joey and I headed out in the rain. It wasn't pouring, but it wasn't just sprinkling, either. I tried to think of a strategy to cover all of the streets. It got confusing after a while! I know the streets SO well from walking them so much, but without looking at the neighborhood from above, it's hard to picture where I am.

Anyway, it never stopped raining... the entire time we walked. I was embarrassed walking down some streets, because I knew it was my second or third time going past those houses. People must have thought I was nuts--walking in the rain past their houses over and over.

All of this is just leading up to say that I did it! Today, I walked every single street in that neighborhood. It took such a long time, too--nearly two and a half hours! I walked 8.42 miles total, with an average pace of 16:46/mile. I can't believe I walked that much for some dumb mission that really didn't mean anything. But I was so excited when I uploaded my run and saw that I'd not missed a single street.


I'm not sure what they consider "slower" and "faster"... I don't feel like walking a 16:46/mi pace is slow, and that's what the majority of my walk shows. I'm curious to know what it's based on, though. 

Now that I completed that goal, I'll probably just continue walking the perimeter of all the neighborhoods. It's a five-mile loop and I can do it totally mindlessly while listening to an audiobook. 

I realize this post is incredibly boring, but it's all I've got today! ;) 

9 comments:

  1. Such a fun achievement! :)

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  2. I walked my longest distance (for this challenge) yesterday as well. We took a "daycation" and went to see some waterfalls we had no idea were even in NE! There were nature trails each place we went (so also going to count that as my 3x walking in a day) and we walked 7.94 miles! Longest I've ever walked in a day was 8.5 in Seattle when we went to visit my son and that was just because, walking is what you do there to get to anywhere without paying for a bus all the time. :)

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  3. This is SO cool! What software do you use to track your runs on the map?

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  4. Good for you! It’s a goal you wanted to complete and you did it!

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  5. Katie, you should just tell the truth! I think you were trying to make a pretty design and you did! You must live in the most awesome place with all that water. I love it!

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  6. I love this! Sometimes pointless goals are the best. And what tenacity. Wow.

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  7. I believe the slower/faster is based on your slowest pace for that activity vs your fastest pace - meaning if, for that walk, your range was between 18:00 and 16:00 then the dark blue sections were about 18:00 and the red sections were about 16:00 and everything else is between those.

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  8. I love that you did this! Especially in the rain. Great job!

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  9. I think the slower/faster is based on that specific activity. I know this is a new feature. I think it just means the fast part was fast for that walk and the slow was your slower portion. Not related to anyone else. I don't think related to any other of your own activities. I think it's isolated to that one activity. But I could be wrong.

    What a cool goal! A friend of mine is tracking streets in our town. Her summer goal was to walk every street in the town! I need to ask her if she did. I think these kind of goals are super fun! Congrats!

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