Comment by bf9d413906
15 hours ago
40+km, every day? Or even if total, it's a proper distance. I'm fascinated by that. Do you just walk around randomly or do you plan things you want to see ?
Walking is imo one of the big "secret" ways to get to know a city. I fondly recall just getting lost on purpose in major cities, and at the end of the day take a taxi, or bus, or tuk-tuk back to the place I was staying. So many things seen, and tried, and random people encountered from all walks of life, it's one of the best things.
Yeah I was doing a challenge of walking entirely across the city, from Woolwich to Heathrow. I think I made it to about Chiswick before my phone died and it was too dark to keep recording on my GoPro. So maybe 30-35k or so that day, and another 20k or so the day before and after just exploring the city more informally.
Agreed that walking is the best way to see a city, for sure. I have done similar one day walks across Brooklyn, Manhattan, etc. and always really enjoy the experience. Usually I have a kind of set goal, like “walk entirely across X place.” I think in Istanbul though I mostly just wandered for 100km (over the course of a week.)
This past summer I walked about 124km around Paris over 5-6 days, going in a spiral through all the arrondissements. That was a great way to discover some new neighborhoods.
Man, we would get along.
I completely agree, it's fantastic both for general fitness, and as a way of exploring. I do this on a smaller scale on a daily basis, walking the 8-10 km route to or from my work (when we have office days). This is walkable in about 1.5 hours, public transport would get me home in around 45 minutes, so I am not really investing much extra time. Varying the route slightly keeps things interesting, and you get a surprising variety with small (1 to 2 street) changes.
Another favourite of mine is cycling around a neighbourhood to get to know it; you get a totally different feel for things than from a car - things typically go by slower, and you are somehow just far more able to observe things.