3 Reasons I Love a Good, Long Walk
Blisters and Bruises included
I love a good, long walk.
I’ve written about it before:
Heck, at this point even I’m beginning to worry I’ll never shut up about it. Not yet, it seems, because hear I am again to ramble about just how much I love a good, long walk and why.
While there are a hundred million reasons to love going on a walk, especially somewhere new, these are the reasons that always stick with me the most.
1.PEOPLE GET CURIOUS: If you’re on a long walk, at some point someone will look at you like he expects you to steal his wallet. That’s just par for the course.
On one long walk I took with a friend, at every single restaurant we went into the employee at the front desk called a manager to see us. I imagine this was an effort to prevent two shady-looking fellows like ourselves from dining and ditching. You can’t blame them.
Just be honest about who you are and what you’re doing and usually you’ll find that people very quickly become interested and want to know more. Don’t be surprised if the same people that shot you suspicious glances at the beginning are the ones asking you the most questions before you leave.
I love this. I think its great.
Most people are naturally drawn to the unusual. It intrigues them, for better or worse. Walkers are generally a pretty unusual group and I’ve often found that, when I’m walking, lots of people want to ask about it.
Talking to new people is one of the best reasons I can think of to go somewhere new and if I look strange enough that I’m an icebreaker all by myself, so much the better.
2. ALL THE LITTLE THINGS: Walking forces you to move slow and take your time.
Its not like a road trip, where the world flies by at a steady sixty miles an hour most of the way as you press on toward the next destination. When you’re walking, plodding along one step at a time through this big, old world, the things that keep you going.
Rounding a corner and seeing an expected view on a forest highway, or discovering a little part tucked away to stop for a bite to eat. Or even a strange little memento left behind by some former traveler who passed that way.
Walking forces you to take stock of these beautiful little moments. They don’t fly by. They saunter. They creep. And if it gives you the chance to soak them up, all those tiny little moments of life that go be unnoticed and unremarked in everyday life.
Oh, and the food. The food! I cannot over-sell how good the food tastes!
After a few days of eating nothing but trail food, going to a restaurant is one of the best ways you can reward yourself. A big, hot, delicious burger tastes like the food of gods after six meals straight of peanut butter and potato bread.
In fact, its one of my favorite things about adventuring. If you go on a long walk, pick your restaurant meals well and you will experience deliciousness the likes of which cannot be described.
In the immortal words of that great philosopher of our time, Spike Spiegel, “Hunger is the best spice.”
3. AT SOME POINT, IT’S NOT FUN: Part of adventuring is overcoming obstacles. That statement, of course, has the inherent implication that there will be obstacles to overcome and this is not always a fun process.
At some point on a long walk, or maybe multiple points, you will want to go home. You will miss your bed, your tent will be wet, and you will be hungry and under-slept and you’ll become increasingly aware of just how annoying your traveling companion really is and how you’re not even sure how you ever liked this person in the first place.
It is moments like these that separated the adventurers from the vacationers. Hold in there, stick it out, keep pushing on despite dangers and discomforts and your reward will be all the better because I can guarantee it is exactly the moments you miss home the most that you will be most proud of when you are telling the story later.
That’s one of the beautiful things about an adventure. Its not always fun. Its a challenge, something that has to be overcome, a standard to be measured against. Persevering in those moments is what makes the undertaking grand.
Even if you have companions with you, there is something utterly personal about being on a long walk. For long, beautiful stretches you will be alone in your own mind, taking in the sights and sounds and feelings of the road.
On an adventure you answer only to yourself. The route you follow, the pace you set, the progress you make, the failures, whether to press on or turn around, all of it falls on you. That is both a beautiful and terrifying thing and it teaches you more about yourself than you would expect. Whatever your motivations for going on adventure, by the time its over you will know something more about who you are than you knew before.
The good news is, when things are hard, just remember they will get easier again. There’s always something new around the next bend in the road.
Here’s the short of it, my friends:
Walking is an adventure.
I have never met someone who went on only one adventure. Once the taste has been acquired, nothing else can really satisfy the cravings. Not all adventures have to big, not all have to be life changing, but I promise that if you succeed on one there will be others to follow.
The independence that you will experience, the obstacles that you will overcome, the food you will taste, the stories you’ll hear, the stuff you’ll see… all of it combines to make an experience that is unlike any other that anyone else will ever have. A uniquely personal expression of independence and curiosity validated by the personal conviction that saw it to fruition, over the peaks and through the valleys and come what may.
Each adventure is special and once you’ve tried it, sooner or later, you will want more.
Go forth, you beautiful people, and have adventures.
