walking : The Art of Non-Conformity

40 Years Later, I Set Out to Walk the Camino de Santiago: Nancy Liddle’s Quest

My name is Nancy and last year I fulfilled my 40-year-old dream to walk the Camino de Santiago in Spain. Being 56, relatively unfit, single, and never having walked more than 10 kilometers in my life was intimidating, but I did it.

Profiles

Walking the Te Araroa Trail : Kylie Lang’s Quest

This is a quest case study. (Read others or nominate yourself.)

I love New Zealand, and when I heard the story of someone who set out to walk the length of both main islands, I had to hear more.

Introduce yourself.

I am a New Zealander who until recently led a pretty standard life as a coordinator of an online sports mentoring program. A few years ago, I got it into my head to walk the length of New Zealand—all 3058 kilometers of it, following the Te Araroa Trail. When I told my husband, he was concerned about me going alone, and that’s when the quest got a theme: Not Alone.
I’d walk the length of New Zealand, but with a revolving cast of people the entire way. And we’d raise money for The Mental Health Foundation as we went.

Why did you decide to undertake your quest?

I believe people need to talk more. So much gets bottled up in our heads. We ponder, overthink, and make thoughts worse, until we talk them out. I handle situations better knowing someone else has heard about it.
Both my father and brother committed suicide—and I know I need to share those experiences and hear about others who have been in the same boat in order to make sense of it all. So why walk? Well, exercise clears my head and helps keep negative thoughts away. Walking and talking seem to go hand in hand.

Twenty-Three Year-Old Nate Damm Walks Across America

When I met the young and ambitious Nate Damm in Portland, Maine (AKA "East Coast Portland") in September 2010, he told me about his plan to walk across America.

Wow. Really? The whole country?

It sounded incredible ... so incredible that I couldn't really get my head around it. At the time, I was just beginning my own cross-country journey, visiting all 50 states during the Unconventional Book Tour. I thought that trip was an adventurous one, but at least I didn't have to WALK everywhere.