Metroparks Meetup: A “round-the-world” walk in the park
Duane Whitmire has walked the circumference of the Earth in 12 years, most of it in the Metroparks
MAUMEE, Ohio (WTVG) - Even on the dreariest of days, Duane Whitmire has a bright outlook on life. The retired BGSU registrar has been logging his daily steps in the Metroparks for 12 years now.
“I was walking 10,000 steps a day, keeping track of them on my Fitbit and the spreadsheet,” Whitmire explains. “One New Year’s Eve, something hit me like ‘You know, if I keep this up, let me figure out how many years it would take to walk around the Earth.”
Earlier this month, he reached his goal -- 24,901 miles, equal to walking around the Equator! Doing the math, that’s nearly 58 million steps -- and he credits being a Metroparks volunteer for much of that. “You have to go out in pairs when you do trail patrol,” he says, “so when I go out with somebody, we usually average around 8500 steps.”
While his step goals aren’t limited to Lucas County, Duane says there’s no place like home. “Some of the most beautiful places I’ve walked were Banff National Park in Canada... Disney has a resort in Hawaii called ‘Aulani’, on Oahu... [or] the walking deck of any Disney Cruise ship. We’re just 3 miles from Side Cut, though... I’ve always liked the beauty of the Maumee River.”
His new goal is to keep up the pace, hitting another milestone just in time for his 80th birthday: “Over the next 6-year period, I hope to go halfway around the Earth... and I calculated that out to about 13,200 steps a day.”
It’s easy for others to get their steps in alongside Duane... but as for that round-the-world trip, “Nobody’s taken me up on it yet!”
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