Marty Bower

Husband, father, lapsed software engineer, skier, clydesdale, hiker, kayaker, data enthusiast, raconteur

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Panorama of Lower Lamarck lake, Eastern Sierra

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Puerco Canyon trail - recording didn’t seem to work for the first mile

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Panorama from the top of the Puerco Canyon trail (click to view)

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Forget Disneyland, THIS is the happiest place on earth #lego (at The Lego Store)

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More Running Routes

An updated map of all of my runs through nearby neighborhoods over the past nine months.

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Nearly all runs were loops between six and eight miles in length. The squiggly-shaped routes to the north were up some serious hills (including one all the way up to the top at Mulholland), and the longer routes stretching out to the beach were one-way. See earlier post for more info on how I created this map.

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Sunset last night (at Electric Fountain)

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My Running Routes

This is a map of all of my runs through nearby neighborhoods over the past year.

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I was curious about where I've run and where I haven't yet. I track each of my runs with the RunKeeper app on my iPhone, so I've accumulated a lot of data over the past year. To generate this map, I wrote a quick-and-dirty program to pull the GPS data from RunKeeper's API, and generated a KML file that Google Maps could use to show all of the runs on one map.

[mjhb]

Great day in the #mountains - even though forced to retreat under #thunderstorms. #cottonwoodlakes #johnmuirwilderness #inyonationalforest #sierra #sierranevada #easternsierra #hiking #trail

[mjhb]

Big Sur Day Trip

Driving up highway 1 from Los Angeles to Carmel (or points north) sounds like a fun drive, but in reality it's a slow, twisty drive that may leave your passengers car-sick before the real fun begins. I prefer to take the 101 and then cut over into the middle of Big Sur where the highlights begin.

View route in a larger map. Click icons for more info on each location.

From LA, take US101 north toward San Francisco and continue on two hours past Santa Barbara to San Miguel. The Mission San Miguel Arcángel is worth stopping to see.

Continue 10 miles up the 101 to the Jolon exit, then head west a little over 20 miles to the entrance to Fort Hunter Liggett. With valid license, registration and insurance papers, you can enter the base and visit the Mission San Antonio de Padua. After visiting the mission, continue on through the base and up the scenic Nacimiento-Fergusson Road.

There is a spectacular view from the top of Nacimiento road down to the coast, which is usually shrouded in fog. The road is twisty and steep, but very scenic all the way down to highway 1.

Turn right (north) on highway 1 toward Carmel and stop in 4 miles for lunch at the Lucia Lodge.

Continue on 14 miles to Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park where you can park and take a short walk over to a scenic overlook of McWay Falls.

10 miles further up the highway is Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park where you can take a short hike through the magnificent redwoods up to Pfeiffer Falls.

There are numerous other attractions in Big Sur - these are just a few of my favorites.

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Seattle waterfront (at Pier 66)

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Flightseeing, a set on Flickr.

A few photos from a sightseeing trip with a friend from work who is a private pilot. We took off from Camarillo airport with Santa Barbara as our destination but the fog / low clouds were too thick, so we flew around the Camarillo / Simi Valley area instead. A beautiful day of flying with a highly competent pilot.

[mjhb]

A day hike in the Eastern Sierra above Independence CA. The Kearsarge Pass trail climbs over 2,500 feet from Onion Valley passing several scenic alpine lakes to a pass over the Sierra Crest, and provides access to the John Muir Trail to the west.  The eastern boundary of Kings Canyon National Park boundary is at the crest.

More photos on Flickr.

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Rodeo Drive Concours d'Elegance 2013

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Tour de California

Last weekend's 1100+ mile road trip around the Golden State. Went to a couple of business meetings in the Bay Area, then spent the weekend with friends near Tahoe.

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Also did a practice run on the Reno-Tahoe Odyssey Relay Race course and scouted the course around Carson City and Virginia City.

[mjhb]

Tracking well to training plan for the Reno-Tahoe Odyssey.  Took a few days off during vacation, but got ahead before then and back on track now.

[mjhb]

It's good in the 'Hood! (at Hood River, OR)

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Reno Tahoe Odyssey Map

Here is a map of the 2013 Reno-Tahoe Odyssey relay run route. All runner exchange points are included. I created it from the course information published on the RTO site.

Links to download data files are below the map.

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Download

To download a file, right click a link below and choose "Save link as..." (or "Save target as") from the popup menu:

KML - for use with Google Earth, Google Maps and other map applications

GPX - another geo data format popular with GPS software applications