Why I Hike

To be outdoors in the sunshine.

To gaze at the blue sky and its grand clouds, shades of white and gray, cumulus or lenticular.

A modality that I share with other creatures, human and animal, but not with cars or buses or trains or planes.

To rely on my body. To get there on my own two feet.

To see the world from up high, glorious vistas, layers of mountains, giant trees, slabs of granite.

Quiet, peaceful. The sound of birds, the rustle of wind in the brush.

Breathing hard, sweating, sometimes exhausted.

Always grateful, always blissful, to reach places accessible by this means alone.

To exalt in nature, to feel unencumbered, to be so alive.