It’s been a long journey, but Katie and Finley finally completed their quest!
You might recall that two years ago, Katie and her trusty dog Finley decided to test THE LORD OF THE RINGS Virtual Challenge series, offered by Conqueror Virtual Challenges. It’s an app that invites individuals to virtually hike famous trails, parks, and fantasy locations! Katie chose to traverse Middle Earth, carrying the One Ring all the way from the The Shire to Mordor. Katie and Finley started on June 2, 2022. After every dog walk, she logged her hours and watched her progress on the app’s neat-o map. She finished October 26, 2024. The grand total? 660 miles.
There were five stops along the journey, and at each stop earned Katie a medal that was mailed to her house. As you can see, they are unique, intricate, surprisingly large, and super cool. One of them glows in the dark!
The company also mails postcards when you reach certain milestones, and they physically plant a tree for every 20% that you walk. For Katie and Finley, that translated to 25 trees! The medal set also included the One Ring. It fits inside the Shire medal and the Mordor medal. But Katie very prudently cast it into the fires of Mordor, thus saving Middle Earth forever. Go Katie!
In case you are wondering where Katie is warming her little hobbit feet, it’s by the massive fireplace in the Yankee Doodle Tap Room. It’s located inside the Nassau Inn in Princeton, New Jersey. It was the perfect location for a restful fireside tankard.
With it’s stone, brick, wood floors, and ceiling beams, The Tap Room really does look like it could belong in the Shire. We just need a house band and a few dozen jolly hobbits.
The Tap Room has plenty of Princeton University touches as well, from a photo wall of famous alumni, to a carved tiger guarding an exit door.
But the most famous feature of the Tap Room is “Yankee Doodle,” an original Norman Rockwell painting that hangs over the bar. One of his largest canvases, it was commissioned in the mid 1930s by Edgar Palmer. Rockwell painted in right onto the wall of the Tap Room. Today, it’s carefully protected by glass.
Congratulations to Katie and Finley on their fantastic achievement! And, if you’re still in hobbit party mode, why not check out this post on Bilbo Baggins’ recent birthday bash?
You either manually enter your miles (or kilometers) or you can sync your activities from your smartwatch or fitness tracker. Participants can walk, run, bike, swim, row – it doesn’t matter how you get there, it just matters that you are meeting your fitness goals and making every mile count. And you can see other participants on their journeys!
As you travel, you are sent digital postcards to commemorate the distance or to share information about your location. Here’s the first one I received:
Most of my miles were completed while walking with my own Samwise Gamgee, my pup Finley, who was more than happy to accompany me on this epic trail. Finley and I typically walk three miles a day around our neighborhood, but there were times when we found ourselves strolling down city streets or on a winding footpath in the woods. I also discovered the route I take on Princeton’s campus from the parking garage to Cotsen is exactly one-mile round trip. And here are me and Finley heading to an outdoor concert in Madison, WI this summer.
I left Bag End on June 2 and arrived in Bree on July 14, trekking 145 miles in 42 days. I thoroughly enjoyed checking in on the virtual map. The digital postcards were a nice added touch of encouragement, along with knowing I planted five trees. Here’s my finish screen:
The back includes an envelope that contains the One Ring, which you are instructed to “Keep it Secret, Keep it Safe.”
And yes, if you look closely, you can see that ring does have the famous Mordor inscription in Tengwar! The Conqueror Virtual Challenges are fantastic motivation to either kick-start a personal exercise plan or to encourage you to keep moving forward on the path to good health. And now that My Precious… I mean… the One Ring is in my possession, I must continue the journey to Mordor. I’m going to extend my subscription and further the adventure!
One, two, three, jump! Are you ready to meet our most popular toddler activity of all time? Ladies and gentleman, may I present…the Crevasse Challenge.
We needed something else. Something less vertical. Additionally, the climbing wall had age and height restrictions, so we wanted an activity everyone could try. So it needed to be adventurous, on the ground, with no age restrictions, and still rock related.
It’s important to mark where the different pieces of the crevasse fit together. That way, on the day of the event, you simply match the pieces, peel the backing off the contact paper, and stick everything in place. We used the matching lettering system below to pair the side cracks with the main crack (the letters were written on the backs of the pieces in permanent marker):
The crevasse is done. Are you ready to rock? I bought these “riverstones” from Discount School Supply. Not only are they colorful and sturdy, they have anti-slip bottoms. At $70 a set, they are a bit of a splurge (especially since we bought 2 sets). But I considered it an investment in quality and safety. After the event, we donated both sets to our local YMCA for further fun.
The rules for the Crevasse Challenge were simple. Start on the first yellow rock and navigate the length of the crevasse until you land on the second yellow rock. If you fell off a rock, you had to start all over again (unless you were very young, and then you just climbed back up on the rock and tried again). If older kids wanted to increase the challenge, they had to complete the course only using the large rocks.
On event day, the Crevasse Challenge was hopping for five hours straight. Kids went nuts for it! The crevasse! The rocks! The jumping! The carabiners! The only challenge was keeping the course clear of kid collisions. But the YMCA folks were total pros, and we had no accidents.
Big kids tried it, little kids tried it, grown-ups tried it, but the toddlers were they main players. They couldn’t get enough of it! My daughter, who was 2 at the time, spent 45 minutes hopping, jumping, running, and trying different rocks. And just look at this cute little guy!