What is Fun, Free, and Very Healthy?-A Nature Walk

Everybody needs to walk to stay healthy, but it can be hard to get motivated. Walking in a mall or other commercial area can be very boring. But it doesn’t have to be that way. If you live in the city, check out the parks. Every big city and most small ones have some parks filled with city wildlife and walkable trails. There may not be large mammals, but there are a never-ending array of birds, small reptile, insects, and other creatures. As well as plants, flowering or otherwise, and many species of tree. Things you might not expect to see living among humans so closely.

Spider Web Pearls

If you live in a suburb or rural area nature is even closer at hand. Strangely, though you make not have to go to an official park, if you live in the country you may have to drive to walk. That is the case where I live. The country road I live on is a back way to get to the nearest town, and is very heavily traveled at times. It is impossible to walk my road, which is two lanes with ditches on both sides. So I drive to the nearest trail where I could walk for miles if I wanted, far from cars, if not people and bikes.

A walk in nature is free entertainment, but you can make it better with a little planning. Find out a little about the plants and animals you are like to encounter, so you’ll know what you are seeing when you get there. Bring water, preferably in a glass container to save the land-fill, a pair of binoculars, and a camera, even if it is just in your phone. The phone itself should be turned off for full benefits to take place. I have seen people power walking and taking a meeting by phone at the same time. I have to ask, what is the point? If you don’t pay attention to where you are you will miss eighty percent of it.

A walk in nature can be wonderful even in winter. Maybe not in the middle of a storm, but right afterwards there are sights that are only seen as the world settles itself after a big disruption. Bundle up and go see what is out there. Whatever the season you will feel so much better afterwards, and so much richer for having opened your senses to the beauty of the natural world.