There are many reasons why people choose to walk. To get excercise is often the reason given. However those of us who spend a lot of time in the mountains know there is more to it than that.

Here are some reasons given by those of a more poetic turn of phrase than me.

“Above all, do not lose the desire to walk. Every day I walk myself into a state of well being and walk away from every illness. I have walked myself into my best thoughts and know of no thought so burdensome that one cannot walk away from it”     Soren Kierkegaard

“Walk away quietly in any direction, and get a taste of the freedom of the mountaineer”   John Muir

“In every walk with nature, one receives more than one seeks”  John Muir

“Thousands of tired, nerve shaken, overcivilised people, are beginning to find, that going to the mountain is going home”   John Muir

“Climb mountains and get their good tidings.  Nature’s peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees.  The winds will blow their own freshness into you. While cares will drop off like autumn leaves”    John Muir

” When we reach the mountain summits, we leave behind us all the things  that weigh heavily on our body and spirit. We leave behind all sense of weakness and depression. We feel a new freedom, a great exhilaration, and exaltation of the body, no less than of the spirit”                                                                                                                                                              Jan Jan Christiaan Smuts