The gentle art of hiking – BionicOldGuy

I enjoyed this book by David Ryan. He lives in New Mexico and volunteers searching for archaeological sites for the US Bureau of Land Management. So it’s no surprise that the book begins with stories about his wanderings in his area, finding important sites and artifacts, including a 10,000-year-old Folsom Man arrowhead. By the end of the chapter, I was convinced that his ideas about hiking in a fascinating area like this would be great.

But how about a more urban area? He responds to this in the next chapter by describing a trip to Los Angeles, which is known more for its highways than for walking. But when he visits there he finds a topic. Before cars were king, the Los Angeles area had an intercity transportation system nicknamed “the big red cars.” It turned out that many stairs were installed in hilly areas to provide access to public transport stops. The mass transit system has disappeared, with many lines buried beneath the city streets. But many of the stairs remain. So he made it his mission to find as many as possible on foot during a visit, discovering not only the stairs but also many interesting places near them. The book goes on like this, describing different areas in the USA. And it’s not just on foot, he also shows how to spice up road trips in the car in this way.

It always helps to have a theme for the adventure. To me it would be obvious Railways. Across the United States, we have converted thousands of miles of disused railroads into trail systems that function as linear parks, great for hiking and biking. I’ve visited all of them in my area, but there are many further afield in California that might make visits to other cities more interesting. And I definitely want to make this a priority when I visit other parts of the US.

David has one too website with resources and stories of his recent adventures.