Trails to Try on Your Own, and Stretching I'm Bad At
We've talked about walking with somebody and letting them win. This lesson is about the opposite situation. Nobody there but you.
This is the last lesson in the habit-building module, so it's a good place to talk about what happens after the class ends. Because it does end. You won't have me falling back to walk next to you, and you'll have to decide for yourself where to go and whether you've stretched enough beforehand, which, fair warning, is a subject I'm the wrong person to teach.
Finding trails on your own
You don't need a guidebook. You need three things: a trailhead you can find twice, a rough sense of distance, and enough water for the dry air we've got at this elevation.
Start with what's close. The canyon trails near American Fork are the ones I know best, and there's no shame in walking the same loop forty times. That woman I met who'd been walking her trail for forty years wasn't bored of it. She still saw new things.
If you want to branch out, ask people at the trailhead what's up ahead. Most walkers are happy to tell you where a trail goes and how steep it gets. That's better information than any app, because it comes from somebody who just walked it in the same weather you're about to walk it in.
A few practical steps for trying something new by yourself:
- Tell somebody where you're going and when you expect to be back. Maria always knows my route before I leave the house. This isn't dramatic, it's just sensible, the same as locking your car.
- Look at the elevation gain before you go, not just the distance. A flat two miles and a climbing two miles are different animals. Up here, that gain adds up fast.
- Bring more water than you think you need. I've said this before and I'll keep saying it, because I ran out once at the turnaround on a hot July day and it taught me a lesson I should have already believed.
- Turn around before you want to. Save half your energy for the way back. This is true whether you're with a group or completely alone, and it's more important alone, because there's nobody to notice if you're struggling.
- Pick trails with a clear turnaround point. A loop is nice. An out-and-back with a landmark, like a bridge or a big rock, is easier to plan around when you're new to a trail.
Steady beats fast. That opinion doesn't change just because nobody's watching you. If anything it matters more, because the only person keeping you honest out there is you.
The cairn
There's a switchback on one of my regular trails where somebody, years back, stacked a small pile of stones. I don't know who started it. First time I saw it I just added one on top, the way you do, and I've added one every time since. It's not tall. It's not a monument. It's just a pile of stones that a lot of people have quietly agreed matters.
I like that I don't know who started it. It means the trail belongs to everybody who walks it, not to whoever put the first stone down. When you're out walking alone, you'll find your own version of that cairn eventually. A bench somebody built. A tree that always has a good view. Something small that isn't yours but that you tend anyway. That's part of what makes a trail feel like it's yours too, even the ones you didn't discover.
Stretching, which I'm bad at
I'll be honest with you here because there's no point pretending otherwise. I don't stretch well and I don't teach it well. My hamstrings have been a lost cause for about fifteen years and no amount of me standing in front of a room demonstrating a hamstring stretch is going to fix that, for me or for you.
What I do, badly, is a few minutes of easy stretching after a walk, not before. Calves, quads, that hamstring situation I mentioned, hold each one for maybe twenty seconds, nothing fancy. I do it because it's better than nothing, not because I've got any authority on the subject.
If you want to actually learn to stretch well, ask somebody who knows. I mean that plainly. There are people who understand the body's mechanics far better than a man who spent twenty years designing systems and only started paying attention to his legs a few years ago. Get a real printout, a real class, a physical therapist if your back or knees are talking to you the way mine did. I'll walk next to you on the trail all day. I won't pretend I'm the right teacher for this part.
Before next time
Pick one trail near you that you haven't tried, look up the elevation gain, and go walk it this week, even if it's short. Bring your notebook.