Eastward the Course of the Avatar Makes Its Way

It's been a while since we checked in on the running Avatar. Remember him? The insubstantial little guy who, as I jog in plodding little circles around town, is out exploring the great continent at the exact same pace? We last saw him in January 2016, in central Missouri. What has he been up to since then?

Well, for a few months after that, he was running vigorously southeast.  Then various things happened, and he sputtered along fitfully for a while.  Then, some other things happened, and there was a three month stretch (August 11 to November 10) when he made it fewer than 15 miles down the road.  And so it was that he found himself languishing just north of Cairo, Illinois, a city that we can safely say has not lived up to the expectations of its founders.

The three months since then, though, have been pretty good!  As I've gone through a mostly-successful running "reboot," the Avatar has explored western Kentucky, visited Paducah, crossed the ferry back to Illinois at Cave-In-Rock, and bopped back and forth across the Illinois-Indiana border a few times.  And now he is in Vincennes, on the banks of the Wabash. He says hi.
 

We haven't looked at the Avatar's journey as a whole since December 2014, so let's get a little context here:

Knox County, Indiana, is his 93rd.  The colors represent years, with the dark purple clump showing the Avatar's initial tour of the Willamette Valley in late 2012.  The little bulls-eyes show counties where the Avatar has been, but I haven't.  There will be a lot of those from now until he gets to Pennsylvania.  And, I bet he'll be dipping his toe in the Atlantic by Summer 2018!  Assuming I am still around myself, naturally.