Last spring I blogged about my plans to walk to Mordor. I updated my progress at the end of August when I was a third of the way through with it and again in November when I was about two-thirds finished.
For anyone who needs a refresher or wasn’t following me when this series began, Walk to Mordor is a free app that lets you chart your miles walked every day and gives you updates on where Frodo and Sam were when they’d travelled the same distance in the Lord of the Rings trilogy.
As I mentioned in previous updates, my kilometres logged varied quite a bit once again for the last third of the journey. I came down with influenza for the first time in many years at the end of December. It was an unpleasant experience that slowed down my progress in this journey. Some days I only logged a kilometre or two of walking, and the recovery period took a while as well.
It’s probably a good thing that none of the good guys in the Lord of the Rings saga caught the flu while they were travelling. They would have been in for a pretty miserable time if they had. Although maybe the elves would have had a secret remedy for that illness?
Pandemic Distraction
Finishing up this trek was a nice distraction, especially during the last part of it when Coronavirus began shutting down so many places to go in Toronto. I’m quite lucky to be able to work from home, but the days do feel long now that I only leave home for walks and occasional visits to the grocery store or drug store.
Reading updates on where Frodo and Sam were and what they were doing in the last third of their adventure has been a wonderful distraction. The challenges we face are obviously quite different from theirs, but I’m seeing interesting parallels between their journey and what we’re all facing this spring.
Like Sam and Frodo, we live in dangerous times where the future is uncertain. All we can do is put one foot in front of the other and do our best to keep pressing forward.
I Recommend This App
I’d definitely recommend checking out this app to anyone who is interested in the fantasy genre, keeping track of their fitness goals, and/or getting distracted by something useful.
As I mentioned earlier in this series, this is something that can be used for competitive or non-competitive purposes. There are no time limits on how long you can use it. People who want to push themselves to walk or run more often can do so, but it’s also accessible to folks who move at a slower pace or who don’t like the idea of turning exercise into a competition.
Reading the plot updates is reward enough. There was no need to add any extra layers of pressure to this game, so I’m glad the developer kept it so simple.
The image in this section of the post shows what the screen looks like after you complete all of the challenges. It was nice to see that long, green list of completed challenges.
One of the things I did have trouble with while participating in this challenge was remembering to log my kilometres walked every day. The app doesn’t have any sort of notification system to remind you to do that. Sometimes I’d have to log several days to a week’s worth of activity. Once I got very behind and logged about a month’s worth of data at once!
With that being said, this is a free game, so I wouldn’t expect it to have all of the bells and whistles that a paid app would have.
If anyone knows of similar games out there, I’d sure like to hear about them. It’s never too early to start planning for amusing things to use next winter.
And it appears you plodded along much more consistently than I did. Bravo! We started at the same time and I have 908 miles to go which is more than 1/2 way. I’ve enjoyed the journey.
😀
I will be cheering you on as you complete it.
This is such a need app! I had no idea it existed. As Tolkien Day was earlier this week, I think it’s perfectly appropriate that I start this journey.
The real question is: Will you start over now that you’ve walked to Mordor? Does one simply walk into Mordor *again*? 😉
Yay! I hope you enjoy it.
And, yeah, I’m seriously thinking of starting the walk over again. It was just that much fun.
Okay, Lydia, I signed up for Mordor. I’m logged in and walked my dog a mile around the track. I tried to put in 1 at the distance that’s marked with X mile made a note of what I did, but it won’t record it. How do I enter the distance?
Okay, so open up the app.
Click on Distance Log on the menu bar. Then click on the green plus sign on the upper left hand corner of the screen. It will open up a new page that has today’s date and 1-2 lines for you to fill in. Put your mile walked in the distance line. There is also a note function if you have any notes you want to keep. (I used that function when I needed to input multiple days at once).
I hope that helped!