Why We Walk

After almost every tour, someone says to me: “You told me there was going to be a lot of walking, but I didn’t realize it was going to be this much.”

They are usually right. We do walk a lot.

Sometimes we walk because it is simply the best way to notice a place. At walking speed, you see the shop window you would have missed from a bus. You hear music coming from an open doorway. You notice the tiles, the gardens, the laundry overhead, the cat asleep in the sun. A city begins to reveal itself in details.

Sometimes we walk because it makes no practical sense to do anything else. Hiring a bus for a short distance can cost more, take longer, and create more logistical complications than simply setting off on foot. Sometimes a car cannot reach where we are going. Sometimes the street is too narrow, the center is pedestrianized, or the workshop is tucked behind a doorway in a lane that was never designed for modern traffic.

Sometimes we walk because we want the freedom to stop.

We can linger outside a bakery, step into a shop, notice something beautiful, or change direction because someone has spotted yarn in a window. We are not sealed behind glass, watching the place pass by. We are in it.

We walk because it is good for us. Not just physically, although there is that. Walking clears the mind. It changes the pace of a conversation. It gives us time to process what we have seen and space to anticipate what comes next. Some of the best conversations on a tour happen while walking between the things that were actually written on the itinerary.

We also walk because sometimes there is no other option. And yes, occasionally it feels uphill in both directions. We see you, Portugal.

But those climbs are often the price of reaching places that have not been surrendered entirely to cars. The hilltop town, the old center, the quiet square, the street where people still sit outside their doors. These places feel different partly because traffic does not dominate every interaction.

We walk because the air is fresh. Because we want to hear one another. Because a place is more pleasant when we are not constantly negotiating with engines, parking, and moving vehicles.

And sometimes we walk because doing so asks something of us.

There is satisfaction in looking back at the end of the day and realizing that the distance which seemed daunting in the morning has become part of the story. We climbed the hill. We crossed the city. We made it.

That does not mean walking is easy for everyone, or that every distance is reasonable. We think carefully about pacing, breaks, terrain, and what a group can realistically manage. There is a difference between a worthwhile challenge and an exhausting day designed without care.

But we do not walk simply because transportation was forgotten. We walk because walking is often part of the experience itself.

A bus can deliver us to the next attraction. Walking connects one experience to another. It allows a place to become familiar rather than remaining a collection of stops.

So yes, we walk a lot.

We walk to notice. We walk to wander. We walk to shop, talk, breathe, and think. We walk because sometimes it is the only way forward. And we walk because, more often than we expect, we discover that we can.