How much training does it take to be able to hike long distacnes barefoot?
I have been walking around barefoot for a week or so now and went on my first barefoot hike yesterday. It was about 3.5 miles on rough and rocky terrain. I am hoping to stengthen them so I can hike barefoot for many miles with no pain. How long will this take/what kind of training?
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I don’t know what country you live in, but it is fairly normal to be barefoot in most part of the world where the temperature stays above 0 C. To be serious about hiking means that you really want to have tough feet, and the only way to get them is to be barefoot all the time.
Recently I had to go to a conference/seminar in another country where bare feet are not acceptable. I was there three weeks and that is the longest I have worn shoes in my life. It took me four days to get any kind of hardness back in my feet when I got home, and after a week everything is back to normal again.
So I guess it depends on where you are, how often you go barefoot, how often you have to wear footwear, and what sort of conditions you normally walk about barefoot in. I do not think it should take too long.
Never tried it
I’m homeschooling my two young boys, and I take them on a lot of hikes and nature walks, as giving them a love and understanding of the Earth is very important to me. I do wear shoes myself, but I’ve always had the boys go barefoot.
We’ve always had a strong tradition in our family that girls wear shoes, but boys go barefoot, and it’s a tradition I’ve always wanted to respect. My dad grew up going barefoot everywhere, including to school, which was very much the rule for boys when he was growing up. Now that he’s retired, he’s gone back to the barefoot ways of his boyhood, and he’s often with us on our walks, as he doesn’t live all that far away. The boys love him and want to be like him, so I follow the same rule for them as Gran insisted on for him. They haven’t worn shoes at all since the first day of spring, and they won’t be wearing any again till late November. Even then they’ll only wear them on the colder days. I do think that’s important, and especially in keeping their feet in condition for the hiking we do.
The ground we cover in our hiking is usually not all that difficult (I usually go in walking shoes myself, and often manage quite well in just my sandals) but a hike of 3 or 4 miles is pretty ordinary for us. As for my boys, if their soles seem a bit soft after a winter that’s kept them too much in shoes, I make sure we start with easy ground in the spring, but by the end of April their feet are up to just about any kind of ground.
I bought my boys a great book on barefoot hiking that I’d certainly recommend. You can actually read it on line if you want:
http://www.bhthom.org/hikertxt.htm
Why do you do these things . Thats weird whats wrong with you??
Congratulations on taking the first steps in changing your life and opening yourself up to a whole new world of sensation and experience.
Barefoot hiking is one of the rare pleasures in life that costs nothing, and will continue to cost nothing so long as you’re not buying shoes. It also helps your carbon footprint as you’re not buying something made of plastic!
As an accomplished barefoot adventurer I can advise you that the best way to train to go barefoot is to actually go barefoot. It’s not always easy but you will start to learn your limits of pain. There are many websites (which have been previously posted) regarding going barefoot.
The short answer is to get out there and walk in the woods barefoot, and slowly work up your limit and tolerance.
You will quickly find that you body was built for going barefoot and that shoes are truly an unnecessary waste of your resources in the right climate.
Good luck on your quest.