By now there are quite a few exercise logging apps with attendant websites out there. The Nike+ pedometer is a fair system with seamless data capture to web page display. Apple/Nike holds your information however, and there is not a way to download or backup your data independently. Runometer, a web source, has taken a crack at it but only to squirrel away your data as well. Nike+ can not record bicycle rides or produce route maps on the fly. Enter RunMonster a quality little application that is easy to use. It will automatically name your runs according to streets, and it’ll even group your runs and figure out whether you walked, biked, or ran, according to your speed. RunMonster creates a gpx file of your tracking event. Gpx is a format understood by most GPS devices using an import/export function. A gpx file can be displayed using HTML and Java Script on the web or with desktop software like Google Earth. I like to upload my gpx file archive to the cloud (e.g. Dropbox ). This practice, in addition to providing a backup resource, provides for a linkable file. Copy pasting this link into the search maps field on maps.google.com will also display your route trace, provide a shareable link, and provide an webpage embeddable link too. RunMonster data outputs to plain text (think spreadsheet). I like RunMonster. My data belongs to me.

The American Tobacco Trail connector between Wake and Chatham counties has not been officially opened but I decided not to wait and gave it a preview on my bike. At N35.828 W-78.929 I came to muddy – Panther Creek. It was swollen from T.S. Ernesto on the week before. Old train trestles remain but sans tracks and there wasn’t a way to cross without fording the gap. Observing a Black Rat Snake escaping through the tall grass further convinced me that a 180 was the natural thing.