One of my most convenient, and often used, walks, is on Shortcut Road near my home.  The above photo shows the road as it heads down to its midpoint at Young’s Creek.  I live in a somewhat rural area (although that is changing with each passing year) and it is exactly one mile from my front door to the start of shortcut road (at its intersection with FM 725).  I like the road because it is lightly traveled, and I often see wildlife (yesterday encountered a huge roadrunner- he was too quick for me to get a shot).  For several years I have watched as a little cactus along the road has persevered and grown-  it sits high up on a tree about 25′ from the ground!  This little cactus reminds me that to succeed, I must have “fierce determination”.  It also reminds me that I need to make the best of whatever comes my way!  Here is a photo of “Fierce Determination”….

As I reach the end of Shortcut Road and its intersection with Hwy 78, I am about half a mile from “The Hill”.  It is not much, but it is my hill!  It is about 50′ high, with its east slope a little steeper than its west slope (75 steps for me climbing from the east point, 90 steps from the west).  It provides me with a little bit of elevation work, and is enough to get my heart pumping and allows me to practice my “Alpine Step”,  or “Rest Step” (see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAQzYtggvWM). Here are a couple of pictures of my hill:

Yesterday afternoon I went out and did this walk, covering a total of 6.78 miles.  I did six sets of “The Hill”, which should amount to over 600′ of total ascent.  A couple of things of note about this little hike-  First, I used a new backpack (that I bought off Massdrop) for the first time.  It is a small waterproof daypack made by Ultimate Direction (https://ultimatedirection.com/) and is pictured above at the top of my hill.  My initial impression of this little pack was quite positive, and it might just be the one that treks the Inca Trail with me.  I will post more details about my search for the right pack under the “Gear Blog” tab on this site.  Second, I am starting to use my Garmin GPS (Oregon 650t model) to better record data from my hikes.  I have owned this little GPS unit for several years, but never really took time to learn how to use all of its features (including Basecamp).  I bought it after being unable to locate my truck after emerging from a long day in a canyon on Cedar Mesa.  Until recently about the only thing I knew how to do was use it to create a waypoint (at my truck, or other starting point like a trailhead) and use that waypoint to find my way back.  I am starting to learn how to record a map of a hike and use graphics to display information about the hike.  Since I will be doing some hikes in the Cuzco area on my own before our group sets out on the trail, I hope to have some pre-planned routes downloaded onto my GPS for use when I get to Cuzco.  Here is a basic map of the hike discussed in this post.  You can see Young’s Creek at about the midway point, and “The Hill” at the terminus of the hike: