by Michael Smith (Veshengro)
Exposure to sunlight helps to top-up Vitamin D supplies and improve happiness and walking also reduces the chances of disease. And sunlight can even be had in winter and 100 calories can be burnt in a half-hour walk.
Winter walks, and walks in general, are great for strengthening the heart and walks in Nature also attune us once again to the good vibration found in plants and trees.
Walking does not necessarily have to mean having to go out trekking in the wilderness, so to speak, though walking in the woods or hiking along, for instance, the North Downs Way, the South Downs Way, a walk up and on Box Hill (Surrey), or such is great and can be extremely good for recharging the batteries.
However, walking to work, to the shops, or to town, something I do quite often, when I am not using the bike, gives, with the exception of the connection with Nature, almost the same benefits.
While walking in the city, with the pollution caused by cars, may not appeal to everyone but it is a fact that (a) often we can arrive quicker at a destination that those battling the traffic and (b), in the same way as using a bicycle, you don't have to pay parking charges and neither in London the congestion charge, and when walking you neither have to worry about your car being broken into or stolen or your bike being stolen or maliciously damaged.
I have, many a times, walked for quite some distance in London and have, I must say, never minded doing so. You also see a great deal more than you do in a car or the subway (Tube), and even a bus. And walking from home to the local town I also do quite frequently, which is a couple of miles, and walking between destinations, even when it is a couple of miles, to me is no hardship and it should not be to anyone whose legs still work. And walking will keep those legs working for longer into older age as well.
So, let's get those boots on for they and the streets were made for walking, and the woods and hills even more so.
© 2016
