Interviews with Five Barefoot Hikers

Over at MightyGoods (they sell various travel gear), they have an article up in which they interviewed five different barefoot hikers.

I thought I’d answer the questions myself.

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Abyssinia Barefoot

The 1800s were a big time for English voyagers to travel the world and then write up their adventures. Mansfield Parkyns went to Abyssinia (nowadays Ethiopia and Eritrea) when he was 20 and lived there for 3 years.

While in Abyssinia, he adopted their dress and customs. That included going barefoot.

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Bright Angel Resthouses

Let me blog again about my trip Out West last June. I’ve been quite derelict on finishing that up.

While I was at the Grand Canyon I ended up doing less strenuous hikes than I planned. Most of that was because it was hot (and I’m aware of the dangers with heat in the Grand Canyon).

But I did make sure I had fun with whatever hikes I did.

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I’m Movin’ On Up

After spending the night of August 23, 2016 at the Bright Angel Campground, it was time to head back up to the top. While heading up is a change in elevation of about a mile, in some ways it’s not as hard. For one, you’ve eaten some of your food so your pack is lighter. For another, you don’t have to carry as much water, since you can refill at Indian Garden (and then at the 3-mile and 1½-mile Resthouses).

On the way up I did get quite a few people asking how my bare feet were doing. My answer: “They’re just fine; it’s my hips that are hurting. I’m used to hiking barefoot; but I’m not used to carrying this pack uphill all the time.”

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The Plantigrady Bunch

A couple of weeks ago there were a bunch of articles about a new study discussing why humans walk heel-toe. The articles related that to dogs and cats, who walk on their toes.

Unsurprisingly, I have some bones to pick with the articles. (Hell, I have bones to pick with just about everything, right?)

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Tayloring a Hike

I’m now up to August 12. Sorry it’s taking so long, but I’m busy adventuring.

Today I climbed Mt. Taylor.

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They Removed the Rough Gravel . . . Maybe?

Lately I’ve been doing a fair bit of walking (I really can’t call it “hiking” in good conscience) at another local Metro Park, Blacklick Woods. It’s not particularly challenging in the usual sense: it’s quite flat, unlike the trails about an hour away in southeastern Ohio.

But it is challenging in a different way.

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The Creek Boys

One of the blogs I regularly read is Lenore Skenazy’s Free-Range Kids. She debunks a lot of the unreasonable fears that parents have these days and advocates for letting kids grow up the way we used to, without having parents constantly hovering and directing their lives.

She recently highlighted “The Creek Boys of Raleigh” and it shows, that given a chance, kids do still go barefoot.

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Yahoos and Legos

On Monday I wrote a bit about Overselling. Of course, these days, with all the internet competition for eyeballs, practically everything is oversold.

Case in point: An article from Yahoo — Why Is Stepping On A Lego So Painful? Science Has The Answer.

Actually, I have a different answer. Wussitude.

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Colorful Characters — Allan Savory

There’s a new series on PBS called Earth: A New Wild. It takes a look at how, while totally wild places no longer really exist on the earth, the animals are being forced to deal with all the humans. This means that there is “a new wild.”

On the Plains episode, they featured a barefooter.

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Another Mid-Winter Hocking Hills Hike

Every year Hocking Hills State Park sponsors a “Mid-Winter Hike” on the weekend near January 20. This year it was last Saturday. I’ll do the hike barefoot when I can, but it can be tricky getting the weather to cooperate with bare feet. Nonetheless, I’ve managed to do the hike in 2006, 2010, 2011, and 2013.

This year was particularly tricky.

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Barefoot Rappelling

Rappelling is one of those things that is just a whole lot more fun while barefoot. Don’t get me wrong — regular old rappelling is a lot of fun, too. But when you can feel the rock wall you are heading down, that adds just that extra touch . . .

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On the Train

Let’s set the Wayback Machine to 1892. Here we’re going to see the beginnings of the urban/rural divide in regards to barefooting.

I suspect that’s where it all started.

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Colorful Characters — Dale Story

We are all aware of Abebe Bikila, who won the 1960 Olympic Marathon running barefoot. And I’ve introduced you to Bruce Tulloh, who won a 6-miler at the British games in 1962 barefoot, and the gold running the 5000m the at the European Championships.

Here is another barefoot winner from the 1960s.

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On Barefooting in Cold Weather

I haven’t shown a poem in a while, but that’s mainly because I really haven’t come across many. But today I have a brand new one by fellow barefooter Chris Billings. He’s from near San Antonio, where you’d think it does get all that cold.

That just means that when it does cool off, the people there are even more aghast at seeing somebody barefoot.

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