And a rousing Walking Rendezvous it was!

Still feeling the buzz from the 1st Annual Walking Rendezvous on June 30th – as so many people have told me they haven’t  had that much fun in a long time.

We were blessed with an evening of favorable weather, foot stompin music by the SilverTone5, tasty as well as nutritious food from the Bistro Bus, and a lively crowd made livelier by Melina of Flowton Hoops who brought a hundred hula hoops and got almost everyone swiveling their hips. Once the kids got it all started (you know, they’re so darn uninhibited naturally) it was so much fun to watch the adults join in (most couldn’t resist). Lots of people told me they hadn’t tried hula hooping since they were a kid. It was quite a sight to see!

Oh ya, we did some walking too. After all, isn’t that the reason we came together in the first place?

At the midpoint of the evening, while the band was taking a break, I encouraged people to take off their shoes and we proceeded to take a sneakerless stroll around the huge grassy fields of Look Park. Man, it’s easy to forget how stimulating it is to walk barefoot. It was like turning back the clock to another time when we were young, carefree, and unencumbered by modern footwear. Talk about a Paleo moment!

And that’s the beauty of walking as an activity (shoeless or not). It gets us moving. You can do it at a pace that’s right for you. You can do it as a solitary experience and make it wonderfully meditative. Or you can do it with others (unofficial count of walkers at the Rendezvous was 130) and receive all the great social benefits that come from engaging in a common activity.

Most gratifying to me was that quite a few people signed up for one of our walking groups (there are four each week at Look Park), and told me they’ve been wanting to become more active, have thought about starting a walking routine, but were unaware of a local walking club. Until now, that is!! So, to call the event a success would be an understatement. And it makes me want to redouble my efforts to create more opportunities for others to share the joy of walking.

Thanks to all who joined in our inaugural Walking Rendezvous!