Wow, you're being bombarded with good suggestions. Although I'd like to add an ingredient that helped me with my constant boredom; if you are going to go exploring or hiking, I found going outside to be incredibly dull personally unless I kept my mind occupied.
For me, that was creative writing brainstorming (plot, character development, etc) almost like organized daydreaming. I'd write it all down when I got home. Although I never did make the game given time constants, I had fun thinking of worlds of my own design.