Hiking is a great hobby for anyone. Get tips and advice on backpacking, hiking, and the great outdoors in this video.
JOHN FLAHERTY: Hi, my name is John and today we are going to do a little beginners intro to hiking. And one of the things that I love about hiking is that it truly is very very simple. You put one foot in front of the other, you get out into a beautiful natural area like this and that is the essence of hiking. Of course there are a few tips and suggestions that will make the beginners experience a lit bit easier and will avoid some of the common pitfalls that people without experience come across when they go outside. First things first, I always like to talk about the feet. Make sure that you have appropriate footwear on. These boots that I am wearing today are more of my heavier duty hiking boots. It is also appropriate, if you are going on easier terrain, to use running shoes or light weight hiking shoes, even Teva's or other hiking style sandals can be adequate if you know what you are doing and the terrain is more forgiving. For dress, I always like to dress particularly lightly. Shorts lightweight one, pants, a t-shirt and maybe a jacket if it is a cooler day that you might store in your pack if you start out and it is warmer but it might be raining later on. As far as carrying some things with you, some very essential or basic things, a day pack is really good for your shorter hiking trips and in that day pack or carrying with you in a water, please bring plenty of water. If you are going to go for an hour or two, one water bottle is sufficient, multiple hour hikes would take multiple water bottles. Well a little bit of food, some snacks, good old raisins and peanuts a.k.a. GORP. And then just an extra jacket, always be prepared even if there is no rain in the forecast, it might rain on you. I always bring an extra jacket like that. First aid kit, sunblock. Those are pretty much the essentials. Now as far as planning a place to go hiking, almost anybody in this country lives near beautiful park or a wild natural area. Today we are at Montana de Oro State Park here in California. As you can see, thousands of acres, wonderful hiking trails here. If you are beginning, I would pick out a trail that might be two or three miles in length, maybe a little bit shorter, pretty moderate terrain. As you get used to it, you can work up and do heavier duty trails with more up and down terrain. 8 or 10 miles with a lot of up and down would be a really full hiking day for folks. That is hiking in a nutshell and I hope that that helps beginners get a feel for it and avoid some of the common problems that happen to folks who do not really know what they are doing out there while they are hiking.
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