Quotes & Sayings About Hiking Mountains

It was a life with purpose. And it was also a lot of fun. Fishing is fun. Hiking up mountains is fun. Building a wall out of river rocks dug up from the bottom of a glacial lake is not fun. Not at all. But it does give a work ethic that you can take anywhere in the world. — Leigh Newman

Hiking - I don't like either the word or the thing. People ought to saunter in the mountains - not hike! Do you know the origin of that word 'saunter?' It's a beautiful word. Away back in the Middle Ages people used to go on pilgrimages to the Holy Land, and when people in the villages through which they passed asked where they were going, they would reply, "A la sainte terre,' 'To the Holy Land.' And so they became known as sainte-terre-ers or saunterers. Now these mountains are our Holy Land, and we ought to saunter through them reverently, not 'hike' through them." — John Muir

I'd have to be impolite, an inconvenience, and sometimes awkward. But if I could commit, all that discomfort would add up to zap predatory threads like a Taser gun. I'd stun them. They'd bow to me. I'd let my no echo against the mountains.

And better to feel bad for a moment saying no - and stop it - than to get harmed.

I would take better care.

That small word, no. I'd see its deity. — Aspen Matis

I love hiking to the top of mountains in L.A. and seeing incredible landscapes. It really inspires me. — Ella Henderson

My motivation to keep hiking was rooted in the magnificent details of the Appalachian Mountains, and the more I poured myself out - the more energy I gave the trail - the more it gave me in return. — Jennifer Pharr Davis

As I ascended, I realized I didn't understand what a mountain was, or even if I was hiking up one mountain or a series of them glommed together. I'd not grown up around mountains. I'd walked on a few, but only on well-trod paths on day hikes. They'd seemed to be nothing more than really big hills. But they were not that. They were, I now realized, layered and complex, inexplicable and analogous to nothing. Each time I reached the place that I thought was the top of the mountain or the series of mountains glommed together, I was wrong. There was still more up to go, even if first there was a tiny slope that went tantalizingly down. So up I went until I reached what really was the top. I knew it was the top because there was snow. Not on the ground, but falling from the sky, in thin flakes that swirled in mad patterns, pushed by the wind. — Cheryl Strayed

It had nothing to do with gear or footwear or the backpacking fads or philosophies of any particular era or even with getting from point A to point B.
It had to do with how it felt to be in the wild. With what it was like to walk for miles with no reason other than to witness the accumulation of trees and meadows, mountains and deserts, streams and rocks, rivers and grasses, sunrises and sunsets. The experience was powerful and fundamental. It seemed to me that it had always felt like this to be a human in the wild, and as long as the wild existed it would always feel this way. — Cheryl Strayed

Sunrise over the mountain-forest was gorgeous - Aurora brushing out her golden tresses with a comb of dark-needled pine and bare-limbed oak. — J. Aleksandr Wootton

This notion of shared experience is important. A hiker, for example, has much more in common with other hikers who have walked paths foreign to him than with sedentary people who have never hiked anywhere but have read books about the hiker's favorite path. If someone has hiked several mountains in Switzerland, for instance, he or she is likely to have more in common with those who have hiked in the Rocky Mountains than with those who have never hiked at all. The terrain may be different, but the act of hiking is similar. The same is true about spirituality. The acts of praying, meditating, fasting, contemplating deeply, and having other direct forms of experience, all influence practitioners differently than mere reading or listening. Moreover, because we all have the same tools to work with - body, mind, and spirit - practitioners from different faiths will have more in common than they realize. — Gudjon Bergmann

The weather here is windy, balmy, sometimes wet. Desert springtime, with flowers popping up all over the place, trees leafing out, streams gushing down from the mountains. Great time of year for hiking, camping, exploring, sleeping under the new moon and the old stars. At dawn and at evening we hear the coyotes howling with excitement - mating season. And lots of fresh rabbit meat hopping about to feed the young ones with. — Edward Abbey

I was fortunate enough not to grow up in Hollywood, so I feel that was a blessing. Being surrounded by nature and animals always kept me grounded and happy. My parents were smart to keep my brother and I away from that nonsense. I do live in the LA area now, but I keep my balance by hiking in the mountains with my dogs and taking trail
rides every week on my horse. — Alison Eastwood

Utah's mountains are not the Himalayas, but by one standard they are the highest in the country. According to a series of stories in the The Salt Lake Tribune, the average elevation of Utah's tallest peaks in each county is roughly 11,222 feet. Colorado ranks second, with an average county high peak elevation of 10,791 feet, followed by Nevada (10,764) and Wyoming (10,179). Alaska, home to the country's highest peak - the 20,320-foot Denali - ranks only sixth, with an average county high peak elevation of 9,280 feet. — Michael Weibel

Desert springtime, with flowers popping up all over the place, trees leafing out, streams gushing down from the mountains. Great time of year for hiking, camping, exploring, sleeping under the new moon and the old stars. At dawn and at evening we hear the coyotes howling with excitement - mating season. — Edward Abbey

A young woman hiking alone in the mountains sounds dangerous. In the pre-cell phone era maybe it was, but I'll stop short of calling it foolish. — Claire Cameron

First and foremost, I've realized that I've been snowboarding for many years, and the biggest high that I get is when I really cut myself off from society, to really know the mountain. The high that I get from hiking up these mountains is a much bigger challenge than taking a helicopter to the top. I have to put more into it, but I get a lot more excitement out of it. — Jeremy Jones

Thousands of tired, nerve-shaken, over-civilized people are beginning to find out that going to the mountains is going home; that wildness is a necessity — John Muir

A man on a hiking trip through the Blue Ridge Mountains came to the top of a hill and saw, just below the crest, a small log cabin. Its aged owner was sitting in front of the door, smoking a corncob pipe, and when the traveler drew close enough he asked the old man patronizingly: "Lived here all your life?" "Nope," the old mountaineer replied patiently. "Not yet." — James Keller

I was sitting by myself the other night doing the usual things one does when spending time alone with yourselves. You know, making mountains out of molehills, hiking up to the top of the mountains, having a Hostess Twinkie and then throwing myself off the mountain. Stuff like that. — Carrie Fisher

I just love all this,' Walt says. 'The sights, the smells, making the effort and pushing yourself and getting something that's really hard to get. I'll fly on a plane and people will look out the window at thirty thousand feet and say, 'Isn't this view good enough for you?' And I say no, it's not good enough. I didn't earn it. In the mountains, I earn it. — Mark Obmascik

Come with me to the mountains. Every rock there tells a story. — Avijeet Das

Within minutes my 115-mile walk through the desert hills becomes a thing apart, a disjunct reality on the far side of a bottomless abyss, immediately beyond physical recollection.
But it's all still there in my heart and soul. The walk, the hills, the sky, the solitary pain and pleasure - they will grow larger, sweeter, lovelier in the days to come, like a treasure found and then, voluntarily, surrendered. Returned to the mountains with my blessing. It leaves a golden glowing on the mind. — Edward Abbey

Do you know how fast you are walking? ... To get a close estimate, count the number of steps you take in a minute and divide by 30 ... — Albina Fabiani

I was able to pitch a tent and carry a backpack twenty-five miles a day through mountains - I'd mastered a thousand amazing physical feats - physically I'd become undeniably confident and capable - but physical weakness had never been the problem that I had. My true problem had been passivity, the lifelong-conditioned submission that became my nature. — Aspen Matis

I walked slowly to enjoy this freedom, and when I came out of the mountains, I saw the sky over the prairie, and I thought that if heaven was real, I hoped it was a place I never had to go, for this earth was greater than any paradise. — Daniel J. Rice

I went into geology because I like being outdoors, and because everybody in geology seemed, well, they all seemed like free spirits or renegades or something. You know, climbing mountains and hiking deserts and stuff. — Kathy B. Steele

I was hiking a five-day loop - alone - in the Rocky Mountains when I rounded the switchback and saw a large body on the trail ahead. It had brown fur with a cinnamon tinge that was draped across dense, humped back muscle. A broad head lifted and I could see the dish-shaped muzzle was catching my scent. I knew bears. This was a grizzly. — Claire Cameron

I love hiking in the mountains in Aspen. Breathing the clean, fresh air is great. Plus, it gives me a cardiovascular workout and firms my legs. — Chris Evert

Half the charm of climbing mountains is born in visions preceding this experience - visions of what is mysterious, remote, inaccessible. — George Leigh Mallory

The mountains were there and so was I. — Maurice Herzog

For some reason, some of my best solutions and ideas are triggered in those dark theaters, usually totally unrelated to what's going on onscreen. I also enjoy hiking in the foothills and mountains close to Sacramento. I always have to bring a pen and paper to jot down sudden thoughts and ideas. So inspiration arises from countless sources. — James Rollins

One evangelical scientist who had felt his doubts falling away from him when he was hiking in the mountains and came upon a frozen waterfall - in fact a trinity of a frozen waterfall, with three parts to it. At that moment, I felt my resistance leave me. And it was a great sense of relief. — Rebecca Goldstein

Speed is not a priority, just enjoy your hike - Keep smile — Barry Perdana Putra