I saw Salim bin Abdullah deliberately seeking out specific spots along the road and praying at them. He would relate that his father used to pray at those very spots and that he had seen the Prophet ﷺ pray at those places.Nafi also told me, on the authority of Ibn Umar, that he used to pray at those same spots. I asked Salim about them, and as far as I know he agreed with Nafi about every one of those places, except that the two of them differed regarding the mosque at the heights of al-Rawha.
رأيت سالم بن عبد الله يتحرى أماكن من الطريق، فيصلي فيها، ويحدث أن أباه كان يصلي فيها، وأنه رأى النبي ﷺ يصلي في تلك الأمكنة. وحدثني نافع، عن ابن عمر أنه كان يصلي في تلك الأمكنة، وسألت سالما فلا أعلمه إلا وافق نافعا في الأمكنة كلها إلا أنهما اختلفا في مسجد بشرف الروحاء.
Bukhari related it in the Book of Prayer (483) from Muhammad bin Abu Bakr Muqaddami, who said, Fudayl bin Sulayman narrated to us, who said, Musa bin Uqba narrated to us, who said, then he mentioned it.His statement, "they disagreed about the masjid at the height of Rawha," means that Salim and Nafi disagreed about identifying the exact location of the masjid at the height of Rawha. Rawha is part of Far, and between it and Madinah lies a distance of two stages. In Sahih Muslim, following hadith (388), it states that it is thirty-six miles from Madinah.Ahmad permitted what Ibn Umar did in this regard, but disliked the excess and extremism that people introduced into it afterward. Ibn Umar was well known for following the traces of the Prophet ﷺ, including praying in the places where the Messenger of Allah ﷺ had prayed. Ayesha used to say, "No one followed the traces of the Prophet ﷺ in his dwelling places as Ibn Umar used to follow them."