My totals for the month:  100,910 steps  in 17 hours and 31 minutes.

My totals for the year:  1,525,580 steps  in 280 hours and 28 minutes.

Although I haven’t been keeping track of miles, I estimate that I’ve walked around 750 miles in those one-and-one-half million steps.  Ironically, that is very close to the distance walking from Longmont to my home town of Minden, Nebraska, and back again.

I went out on 71 days, so roughly once every five days.  If you look at my finished map below, you should be able to count 71 separate ‘neighborhoods’ colored in.

I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this before, but I wore the same pair of New Balance shoes for every single one of these walks.  The soles are getting a bit worn, but they’ve served me well… and I think I’ll still get a few more miles out of them!

I’ve also been very happy with the camera I took on all my walks…. a Nikon Coolpix S203, with a 3x optical zoom.  My photographer daughter Crystal lent it to me for the year… but I’ve told her I don’t want to give it back to her.   I’m guessing I’ve taken more pictures this year with this camera than in my entire previous life.   [ I just did a rough tally of the pictures I took on my 71 outings, and it comes to 6,480 photos.]

Some of you may remember one of my ‘digression’ blogs where I tried to get a photo of all 50 states during my walks.  Well, I got all but Rhode Island… and I saw one of those at the stoplight at 17th and Lashley while biking home once, but didn’t have my camera out in time.   I got a bunch of thank-you notes from a 1st grade classroom at Central Elementary for a talk about my walking there, and one of them said they hoped I would get Rhode Island.  Alas, it was not to be.   I saw surprised that I got two Hawaii photos.  I believe I only saw one Vermont and one Delaware license plate during my walks.

Unless something comes up, I’m planning on a final follow-up to my Longmont Streetwalking tomorrow morning (Sunday, December 29th).    I think I’ll leave the house at about 6 am, head north to Highway 66 and Alpine, and then walk  counter-clockwise around the entire city in one day.   It will be roughly a marathon (26 miles), and I figure it will take about 9 hours… so finishing about 3 in the afternoon.

If I DO decide to do this, I’ll  put my estimated time of arrival at different points down in case anyone wants to come out and say ‘hi’.  It’s like my ‘Farewell Tour’!   I’ll have my cell phone with me (303) 845-2187 if anybody wants to call and verify my progress report at any time.  Or feel welcome to come walk for a mile or so if you want…  I’ll be wearing my beat-up red sweatshirt, so you should be able to see me from quite a ways off !

9:20 PM Saturday night… I think I’m going to go for it tomorrow morning.   So here’s my expected path and times of arrival:

UPDATE SUNDAY MORNING — I’M NOT GOING OUT TODAY AFTER ALL.  A LITTLE BIT OF SNOW LAST NIGHT, AND NOT SURE WHAT THE DAY IS GOING TO BE LIKE.  SO I THINK I’LL GIVE IT ANOTHER SHOT IN EARLY JANUARY SOMETIME.

Leave house at 6 am.  Go north on Alpine to Alpine and Hwy 66.  Go west on Hwy 66.

7 am   —  Arrive at Hwy 66 and Main St.

8 am   — Hwy 66 and 75th St. (turn south toward Hygiene)

9 am — 75th St. and Nelson Road

continue south on 75th St. to Plateau, go east on Plateau.

10 am — Plateau and 79th St.

go south on 79th St, take a little jog to 81st St., then south to Oxford Road, turn east on Oxford, northeast on Hwy 119, cross Hwy 119 and go east on Ogallala Road (right at Airport Rd).

11 am — Hwy 119 and Ogallala / Airport

east on Ogallala to Hover (95th St.), north on Hover to Plateau, east on Plateau

12 noon — Main St (hwy 287) and Plateau

north on Main to Prospect, east on Prospect to 119th St., North on 119th to Ken Pratt  ( I would go on Quicksilver to County Line Road, but the bridge is still out there)

1 pm —119th St. North and Ken Pratt Blvd.

NE on Ken Pratt, cut through on Great Western Drive to County Line Road, turn north on County Line Road.

2 pm —- County Line Road and 17th St.

continue north on County Line Road to Hwy 66, west on Hwy 66 to Alpine, and south on Alpine back home

3 pm — home again