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Self-organising walk groups for Londoners and tourists |
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76%
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16 votes,
Feasibility
0%
Originality
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John Keats the poet loved walking: "The open sky sits upon our senses like a sapphire crown - the Air is our robe of state and the Earth is our throne." Thoreau, the American writer who lived for several years in a shanty by Walden Pond, felt that he couldn't preserve his health and spirits "unless I spend four hours a day at least - and it is commonly more than that - sauntering through the woods and over the hills and fields, absolutely free from all wordly engagements."
I love walking too. I sit in front of a computer all week in my Cricklewood office and I long for Saturday. For the last six years or so, whatever the stormy weather, my religion has been to go walking with a group of friends and friends of friends.
We have called our group various names over time, from the Walking Talking Never Ending Perpetual Motion Encounter Group and the Gourmet Walkers to the Adventure and Romance Agency - and indeed the walks have led to several romances.
It is a wonderful way to have an inexpensive party. Each Saturday, we take the whole day for a walk of about 9 miles: we catch a train from a London station, walk to a pub, walk to a cream tea and give each other foot massages on the train home again.
'To replenish one's joie de vivre'
What better way is there to stay healthy, to be surrounded with beauty, to appreciate the glories of the countryside, to meet friends and make friends and to replenish one's joie de vivre?
My fellow walkers feel like my tribe. Evolution hasn't had a chance to catch up yet. Nowadays, we live in our nuclear families, we don't even know who our neighbours are, and we feel bereft and isolated. Surely we still need to feel tribal.
So here is an invitation to join our tribe! The Ramblers Association groups seem to attract mainly older people. To encourage all ages to take up walking, I have founded the self-organising Saturday Walkers' Clubs, which have no membership charges, and which are intended to attract both Londoners and tourists.
The dates and times and where to meet are all set out on our Internet website and they are also to be found charted until the year 2010 in the fund-raising book I have written (for the Institute for Social Inventions) to describe the club walks, the new Time Out Book of Country Walks (£11-99, Penguin, credit card orders 020 7359 8391).
'A walk for Adventure and Romance, a walk for gay men, another for lesbians, and other walks for artists, ravers and late risers'
Because the walks have proved so popular there are now various sub-groups: the Nature Walk, the Main Walk (Vigorous), the Main Walk (Relaxed), the Children's Walk, the Late Risers Walk, the Artists Walk.
So, whatever your inclination, join us!
Please order the book for £11.99 from the GIB store.
Nicholas Albery
The following is an old account of activity which has now developed enormously - see the large Time Out Saturday Walkers' Club website.
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