Welcome to the Shire

Welcome to the SHIRE, the starting ground for a VERY LONG and RIGOROUS journey.  We're gathering here to take the first steps on our journey to destroy the ONE RING and change our world. The ONE RING is a symbol of our bad habits and unhealthy selves that we are journeying to demolish at the goal of Mt Doom in Morder and travel past that into a lifestyle change of a more active day-to-day.

You can walk, run, crawl, jog, crabwalk, dance, skip, hop, or mosey your way there.  What's important is the journey and moving forward with a challenge that will help create one LARGE GOAL (the 3,664 miles to go THERE and BACK AGAIN), split into smaller journeys, each with their own destination.

The main idea is to increase our daily activity and go farther distances.  I'll only be recording mileage added from NON-DAILY activity (meaning stuff other than walking around at work, walking to the car, walking to the bathroom, etc).  I will let you use your daily activity IF you have an accurate way of measuring it, i.e. a pedometer that shows distance/mileage, etc. Be warned: if you try to use a GPS distance app like RunKeeper, etc and leave it on all day, your phone will die VERY quickly!

OUR JOURNEY

"THERE" -- First we'll travel 458 miles from the Shire, Hobbiton, to the Elven outpost of Rivendell, the "Last Homely House East of the Sea." Next, we'll make our way 462 miles to another Elven stronghold, this one deep in the forest, named Lothlorien, the "Heat of Elvendom on Earth." From there, our journey will take us to Rauros, 389 miles on foot.  Rauros is the area surrounding the great waterfalls on the River Anduin, and from these falls we will begin the final leg of "THERE" to Mt. Doom in Mordor, a path leading 470 miles to the interior of the burning mountain.

"BACK AGAIN" -- After we've destroyed the ONE RING and been rescued from the fiery destruction of Mt. Doom by Gandalf's eagle, upon waking we'll find ourselves in Minas Tirith, a human stronghold known as the City of Kings and built into a mountain.  From there we will travel 535 to Isengard, the dark one of the Two Towers, and then will make the 693 mile trek back to Rivendell.  From Rivendell we will make our way to Bag End (the Baggins residence), 397 miles, and then, following Frodo's path, depart Bag End for the Grey Havens, where we shall leave this world with the elves.

OUR STARTING POINT

http://lotr.wikia.com/wiki/Hobbiton

OTHER INFO

• This blog is strictly for updates on each participant's progress towards Mordor and beyond.
• There might be other updates on here as well, like when we get a new participant, etc. :)
• Keep in mind that this is a MARATHON and not a SPRINT!  This will probably take at least a year for most of us, if not longer.

Our Fellowship of Hobbits

Hobbit	Date Joined
Steven	7/23/2012
Alex	07/23/2012
Felicia	07/23/2012
Lenore	7/23/2012
Liz	07/24/2012
Caty	8/6/2012