Just Doff It: Barefoot Hiking

by Darren Richardson

A walk in the woods can be the perfect escape from the stresses and fast pace of modern life. Hiking allows us to enter a sensory-rich world with fresh air for the lungs, beautiful landscapes for the eyes, the stirrings of wildlife in the brush to tantalize the ears. And, for a small but growing number of nature lovers, the cool, soft touch of bare earth against their bare feet.

Many of us have had a favorite pair of "broken-in" athletic shoes or hiking boots, but how many of us have ever made a conscious effort to experience and develop the "shoes" we were born with? A good-fitting pair of sneakers can provide essential support during a workout or race, but even the best shoes do not provide one necessity that both athletes and non-athletes often overlook - exercise for the feet.

That oversight can be remedied without spending hundreds of dollars on new footwear to set your feet on the right path.

Just go barefoot.

Richard Frazine, author of The Barefoot Hiker, believes that too many people fail to treat their feet to the simple pleasures and health benefits of barefoot walking.

"A substantial number of people who genuinely love going barefoot and do so almost everywhere have been convinced they could never do so safely in the woods," Frazine says. "The truth is that forest trails are actually much easier on bare feet than pavement, and generally safer than many public beaches.

"A barefoot hike can be one of the most enjoyable hikes you've ever taken, if you also take the time to follow a few simple safety rules. You have to remember you're not out there trying to rack up the miles; you're trying to experience each step. It's intensive, rather than extensive, hiking."

Frazine, 50, leads barefoot hikes at two- or three-week intervals in all but the most extreme New England weather. Frazine says that walking barefoot on grass, dirt trails and even short distances on sidewalks is safe and healthy for most feet. "Except in the coldest weather," Frazine maintains, "we can go barefoot as comfortably and as safely as cats and dogs."

Frazine points out that hiking barefoot is also a good idea for environmental reasons: "Walking barefoot, as nature intended, humans hardly disturb even the most delicate ground cover, [but they] can still delight in the soft, carpet-like feel of moss in good conscience."

On the West Coast, 41-year-old Mike Berrow founded the East Bay Barefoot Hikers in Oakland, California after reading Frazine's book. Berrow's hikes have drawn more than 20 people on a single morning.

"There's something about doing it in a group that is nice - like horseback riders or cyclists on the trails together," Berrow reflects. "We are moving through the landscape on an entirely different level, and it's good to be able to share the feeling with others who enjoy it."

And plenty of others do. Barefoot hiking groups now can be found in North Carolina, Ohio, Michigan, Kansas and Oregon. There are three groups are active in California and a group has formed near Vancouver, British Columbia. Barefoot hiking recently went trans-Atlantic with the formation of a group in Sweden.

Feel the Earth, Foot-first

San Francisco-based podiatrist Arlene Hoffman says that barefoot hiking can be a step in the right direction for foot health - provided there are no related pre-existing medical conditions.

"Like the body itself, feet also need exercise and the opportunity to experience a fuller range of motion than one gets while wearing shoes," Hoffman says, emphasizing that barefoot hikers need to pay special attention for any hazards that might lurk on the trail.

For lifelong barefoot hiker Aymii Couzelis, a 24-year-old computer systems analyst from Boulder, Colorado who grew up running through the sand in a beachfront community, going shoeless has always come naturally. Hiking in shoes hurts her feet. "I get blisters, my toes feel cramped and the whole experience is unpleasant." And Couzelis doesn't have to worry about athlete's foot. "My feet never smell, either," she adds, as a footnote.

Heather Silva, a student at northern California's College of the Redwoods, has walked barefoot all her life. "I feel real clumsy with shoes on," Heather insists. She even went shoeless to her high school prom - tying ribbons around her bare feet like sandals.

The Bad News about Shoes

Like hands, feet are designed to be specialized instruments of touch. Unfortunately, with so many competing shoe choices and so much frenzied marketing, far too many people in modern society think that feet exist for the sole purpose of displaying footwear.

Human beings delight in pleasing their senses, from listening to music to smelling the air after it rains. Yet, for many, the human foot - described by Leonardo da Vinci as "a masterpiece of engineering and a work of art" - languishes for hours on end in dark, constrictive shoes.

In 1972, podiatrist Steele F. Stewart published a paper on the history of footgear in the journal Clinical Orthopaedics and Related Research. Stewart concluded that shoes were a major source of foot problems, that the remedy was a "more natural physiological use of the feet" and that "we should learn the pleasure and painlessness of going barefoot."

A 1950 article by chiropodist Samuel B. Shulman in the Journal of the National Association of Chiropodists observes: "Shoes are not necessary for healthy feet and are the cause of most foot troubles. Children should not wear any footgear until absolutely necessary. Footgear is the greatest enemy of the human foot."

With Richard Frazine and other shoeless pioneers talking the talk and walking the walk, renewed appreciation of humanity's oldest means of transportation is growing. In the process, more people are taking the next natural step, putting one bare foot in front of another and experiencing - first-foot - the wide variety of the earth's textures instead of the monotony of sweat, socks and rubber soles.

Darren Richardson is a freelance writer and professional foot reflexologist from Berkeley, California. Copies of The Barefoot Hiker may be ordered from the author, 50 Lehigh Avenue, Thomastron, CT 06787. For information, see alt.lifestyle.barefoot.