15-48

Mile 151.  A high quality Tortoise walk to pass 150 miles for the year.  Another five mile walk where the terrain was hilly enough for a 4.6 Tortoise rating without the need for a Benjamin category override.  We get some fifty year old Tortoise history while we are at it, in a location that when the Pacific Crest Trail was later established, passes through.  It's known for being a good filming location, and Lou had to wait for a film crew to clear the road when the walk was complete and he headed to his next appointment.

There are over seventy pictures waiting for you and other details of today's walk, along with a classic walking thought by Gordon Hinckley, when you click below to continue reading ...

Cheerio!

Vasquez Rocks County Park.  Tortoise has good memories of day camp here
as an 11 year old Boy Scout in what was then called the Guide Patrol

Vasquez Rock picnic ground

We join the Pacific Crest Trail at mile 452.9 in the picnic area

If we're close enough to Los Angeles to come here on a day camp,
we're sadly close enough for smog.  This was still a great walk.

Lou likes the high signs so that passing equestrians can see them easily.

Tortoise apologizes for the rogue finger that keeps appearing in these pictures.

Here we begin some fun signs identifying a diverse array of local plants.

The birds are loving the scrub oak.

Just bid farewell to these equestrians going the opposite direction.

Approaching the tunnel under Highway 14,
a major southern California traffic artery

The other side of the tunnel.  PCT mile 451.1.

Today's turnaround point, looking up at Highway 14 at PCT mile 450.4.

And the Pacific Crest Trail just keeps on going ...

Tortoise completed today's 5.09 mile walk in 1:41:42 hours.  Tortoise rating was 4.6, based on 459 feet climbed in the 2.55 mile uphill portion (average elevation 2459). 749 calories were burned along the way.

Tortoise's walking map provider, www.mapmyfitness.com, has changed formats and the maps haven't transferred to this blog as well since.  (Lou keeps trying without success.)  Instead of embedding the map, let's try these links and see if that works better for you to see where he walked today:

http://www.mapmyfitness.com/routes/view/635388952

And here are the overall stats so far for 2015:

151.90 miles walked, which is 15.16% of Lou's 2015 goal. On this day in 2014, Tortoise had walked 145.23 year-to-date miles.  

44:41:59 hours walked, which is 14.28% of the 2015 goal (which is to walk 1 hour a day on the 313 days other than Sunday in the year)

7,486 total feet climbed, compared with 7,710 feet on this day in 2014. 

22,645 calories burned

13.10% of the year has passed

Lou has walked 49 consecutive non-Sundays since his last missed day on December 22, and overall has walked on 339 of the 354 non-Sundays since the beginning of 2014, a 95.76% consistency rating.

The purpose of the percentages is to have a higher percentage of distance and time walked than of the year. This tells Tortoise that he is on track. Yes, this is more numbers than you are likely interested in, all Tortoise can say is he's really good at setting high goals and having them slip away because he doesn't do them every, every day.  (If you doubt this, compare Tortoise's 2013 walking record with 2014)

And now for today's walking thought, initially presented in April 1996:

"He looked at me a little reprovingly, and the first words he said: ‘Joseph, you are late.’ Yet I took confidence and replied:

“‘Yes, but I am clean—I am clean!’

“He clasped my hand and drew me in, then closed the great door."

It is of great value to be able to say, "I am clean"

To watch, listen to, or read this message in full, please visit https://www.lds.org/general-conference/1996/04/be-ye-clean?lang=eng #ShareGoodness

The tortoise is smiling!