Got his e-mail from a guy named Jim the other day:
I haven’t read through all of your entries yet. Maybe what I would like to
know is in there someplace. I’d like to see you do an entry on why you hike
so much, how you got started, all that kind of thing. I’ve been thinking about
this subject for a while since people keep asking me why I hike. I’m just
curious but it would make an interesting entry.
How it began: There were woods behind the subdivision where I spent
about 10 of my formative years; I always loved walking through those woods,
listening to the birds, wondering what I might see. I joined the Boy Scouts
to go on the campouts; I earned two or three merit badges and had no intention
of ever becoming an Eagle Scout. I just wanted to be out there.
What happened in the middle: Becoming a grown-up became a 27-year distraction
from the simple joy of walking in the woods. I went to college, started a career,
moved to Florida, got married, moved back to my hometown, then moved again,
to the Bay Area. Lived here for five years before stepping foot on a trail.
Then we moved to a place in the hills overlooking Silicon Valley and I got on
a fitness kick enabled by the weight I lost walking up and down the two-lane
blacktop that snakes its way through our neighborhood. I got sick of sore feet
and automotive near-misses and started walking on the trails in nearby parks.
Once I saw the view from the top of Mission Peak (2000 feet of elevation gain
in 2.5 miles) for the first time, I was pretty much hooked. That was in the
summer of 2004 and I’ve hiked almost every weekend since then, with a few training
hikes thrown in during the week to keep the fat off.
Why I’m still at it: I get things on the trail that I don’t get in
town, or on TV, or sitting in front of my keyboard. A few examples stuff I didn’t
experience until I started hiking all the time:
- I never saw a bobcat in the wild until I started hiking. One morning I saw
one leap across the trail and disappear into the woods in about a half-second. - I never yelled "I’m not dead, dammit!" to vultures circling overhead.
(Hiking alone in open country triggers their circling instinct). - I never heard coyotes yapping somewhere behind me on a fogged-in hillside.
- I never learned I could walk 19 miles in one day.
- I never experienced the rush of taking in a broad expanse of ridges and
valleys visible only to those who trudge to a hilltop on foot. - I never learned how to survive a night camped out on the snow high in the
mountains. - I never awoke next to a mountain lake that was calm as glass.
- I never saw the rising sun turn a hillside orange at dawn.
Mainly, it comes down to experiencing new things, wanting to experience them
again, and expecting to experience even more new things on future adventures.
I have a similar story, and have been following your blog for a long time now.
I used to hike & camp a lot as a kid. As an adult I needed to lose a bunch of weight, and couldn’t really stick to anything.
Then I remembered all the outdoors stuff I used to do when I was younger. That really helped me to do something which I enjoyed to get into shape. This was the first site I found that really got me back into it. Being a Bay Area local, this blog appealed to me. I have been hiking, camping and backpacking since the first of the year and have since lost the extra weight and have gotten back into photography (another old hobby) and have been enjoying the outdoors again.
This site always offers something fresh and keeps me interested in hiking.
Keep up the good work.
I have been hiking & backpacking, (mostly day hiking now), for many years, for all the reasons above plus one other. Each year I look forward to hiking some of the same trails I have hiked numerous times. As I do this, with each passing year there is a growing sense of connectedness to the seasons and to time itself as I journey over familiar ground encountering recognizable landmarks. While I always see things not noticed before I also see many of the same things again giving me a feeling of permanence and stability. I hope to hike these trails many more years!
Each of you has offered quite eloquent thoughts here, all of which I can relate to but possibly cannot improve upon. But I’d like to try.
There are moments out there — real, honest, emotion-inducing moments wherein the eyes well up, the spine tingles, and the captured memory — of such a single astounding yet fleeting blip in your Life — finds itself inescapably resonating with you long after you’ve left the trail. Be it a tree growing out of a rock and thriving, or two rattlesnakes mating, or a night filled with horizon-to-horizon meteors, or directly making eye contact with a bobcat, there is nothing like hiking in Nature to bring balance and absolute harmony to one’s Life. Not to mention endorphins and the smell of a forest.
We need to be thankful that we have such bounty around us that we can escape into when the feeling calls. I for one cannot fathom what it would be like for me to forsake regular visits to the wilderness — even when it’s just the local paved bike path along the creek at lunchtime.
Come to think of it: there was an extraordinary man in my early life who shaped much of the person I am today, and his name was also “Don C.”; he was my music teacher in high school, but also (lucky for me) an avid backpacker who advised our student’s backpacking club. I learned so much from Don about organizing trips, menu planning, wilderness ethics — even climbing knots. I remember less about playing the tympani for him than I do the fundamental grounding — and desire to be OUT THERE– that he left with me.
If you and your wife Carol are still out there tramping trail, Don, I sure hope to walk with you again.