Fedak sent along a link to an interesting discussion on the appeal of hiking.

A very good book on the subject of walking is written by Rory Stewart, The Places In Between. Mr. Stewart is a historian who finds himself learning about the past while walking. In his latest book, he walks across Afghanistan from Herat to Kabul. He follows in the footsteps of Babur, the first emperor of Mughal India. And he begins his walk only two weeks after Taliban has fallen in the dead of winter. In this book, I enjoyed the following perspective on the topic of walking:

“I thought about evolutionary historians who argued that walking was a central part of what it meant to be human. Our two-legged motion was what first differentiated us from the apes. If freed our hands for tools and carried us on the long marches out of Africa. As a species, we colonized the world on foot. Most of human history was created through contacts conducted at walking pace, even when some rode horses. I thought of the pilgrimages to Compostela in Spain; to Mecca; to the source of the Ganges; and of wandering dervishes, sadhus, and friar who approached God on foot. The Buddha meditated by walking and Wordsworth composed sonnets while striding beside the lakes.

Bruce Chatwin concluded from all this that we would think and live better and be closer to our purposes as humans if we moved continually on foot across the earth. I was not sure I was living or thinking any better.”

A similar thought occurred to me the other day. No matter what silliness people have dreamed up in the “industrial era,” people have always walked. They always camped out in the wilderness, until civilization came along (and things have been going downhill ever since). Hiking is the essentially human activity.

A lot of writers get a bit too awe-inspired by walking in nature for my taste … the compulsion to convey the greatness of being out there has generated enough purple prose to fill the Library of Congress. What I get from nature is a reliable collection of experiences summed up in a single word: “wow.” (Or, these two, because mama tried to raise me right but I refused: “Holy shit!”)