Thirty-One Trails

You take a step. The figure takes a step. A buzz goes up your wrist.

Thirty-one trails, in a row. Pine forest. A creek with a bridge across it, and a creek without. Switchbacks. The snowline. A flag at the summit. And at the end of the row, in the middle of a city, a lake: Lady Bird, flat and bright, with a trail around it and turtles lined up on a log.

It is the only one on the list you have walked.

Ahead, the path drops to a creek. To the left it turns back on itself and climbs.