Sarah Baxter - A History of the World in 500 Walks
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- Year:2019
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OF THE WORLD IN
WALKS
Sarath Baxter
Ask anyone what superpower they would most like to have, and Id wager that time travel would be in most peoples top three. Its such a tantalising prospect: the chance to sneak a glimpse at an era long gone, and to understand our modern world by bearing witness to the moments that delivered us to it. How illuminating would it be, to see Allied troops fighting in First World War trenches, or the rise and fall of the Roman Empire? Imagine travelling back to the time when Africas early hominids first stood erect, or when the dinosaurs roamed the world.
Yet, you can travel back in time by choosing the right mode of transport namely walking and using a little imagination. Walking is as ancient as those early hominids. Eschewing cars, planes, and trains puts us on a level playing field with our forebears, and allows us to see the world through their eyes. Even if elements of the view have changed over the millennia, treading on ground stomped by the soldiers, kings, pioneers, and pilgrims of the past provides a connection back to them.
So let this book be your time-travel guide. A History of the World in 500 Walks is a compendium of trails of varying distances and difficulties, spanning the globe designed to help you connect with the past. Arranged chronologically, in six chapters, the book moves along the timeline of our planet. It starts at the very beginning prehistory a mysterious era before written records, when the world was busy making itself: tectonic plates were shifting, volcanoes were spewing, mountain ranges were inching up and weathering down, and man was making his first forays into the world.
The lost city of Machu Picchu is the finale of the Inca Trail (shown ).
From these geological glory days, we reach the dawn of civilisation, and via indigenous Australian peoples, San Bushmen, ancient Greeks, Roman emperors, Buddha, and Jesus we eventually plunge into the centuries Anno Domini (AD). These past 2,000 years are liberally woven with pilgrimages, trade routes, military marches, and the adventures of great explorers. We follow famous expeditions, chart revolutions and the Renaissance, witness the beginnings of leisure tourism (that is, walking for walkings sake), and even amble with astronauts. Each trail, be it one mile or one thousand, has something to say about the origins of the planet.
So where to begin? There are 500 individual walks here, accompanied by inspirational maps and photography. In the main they are measurable, definable trails: routes with a known start, end, and distance, and perhaps an evocative name South Africas Fugitives Trail (shown ), for example. Some walks are covered in greater detail, to give you a good idea of what awaits. Others are intriguing snippets to make your feet itch and your imagination fire. All are firmly rooted in history, and all unravel as if they are the very best textbook brought to life in full colour, surround sound, Smell-O-Vision, and 3-D. Simply, in these walks, the history of the world comes to life.
As I was compiling a list of walks for this book, some walks immediately stood out. For instance, the Inca Trail (shown ), a four-day hike through the Peruvian Andes that traces precision-laid, fifteenth-century pavements to reach the hill-teetering city of Machu Picchu, never found by the Spanish conquistadores. What better way to comprehend the engineering genius, societal structures, and spiritual beliefs of this once-dominant South American civilisation than by walking amid the mist-swirled mountains little changed in the past 500 years that they called home?
Likewise, the rim-to-rim trails across the Grand Canyon (shown ) seemed a must. To descend from one lip of this ravishing ravine and climb back up the other is to observe millions of years of rock formation and erosion in extreme close-up. It is more vivid and accessible than any geography lesson.
The mining heritage of St Agnes in northern Cornwall is just one of the treasures of the United Kingdoms South West Coast Path (shown ).
Trek through the desert to Jordans famed rose-red city of Petra (shown ).
Then theres the Berlin Wall Trail (shown ), which tells a more contemporary tale. Following the footprint of the barrier that once encircled West Berlin, and which only came down in 1989, this circuit reveals history at its most raw and freshly formed. To stand at Checkpoint Charlie, or beside hunks of graffitied concrete amid the now-thriving city, will make your spine tingle.
There are so many enticing trails packed into these pages, with something to suit every interest and mood. A few favourites? How about Greenlands awesome Arctic Circle Trail (shown ), which cuts through New Zealand landscapes beloved of Sir Edmund Hillary, one of the first men to conquer Mount Everest.
Hike up a mountainside and you might appreciate its grassy meadows or snow-cloaked drama. But know that a whole legion once marched here, or that these slopes inspired a composer to pen a masterpiece, and the whole scene changes. The mountain remains dramatic, but it now also becomes a strategic obstacle or a musical muse.
The main lesson Ive learned from writing this book is that there is history to be found everywhere. Whenever and wherever you walk and its great to walk, widely and often someone or something has almost definitely gone before. And that is not a bad thing. It enriches every ramble. It means we can stride out amid landscapes made wonderfully weird by geothermal activity. We can stroll via crumbling castles, walls that kept people in, walls that kept people out, furrows made by slaves and escapees, streets lined with epoch-defining architecture, or really, really old trees.
If only the earth could talk. Though if you look closely at the grooves and the hummocks, at the scattered ruins and the well-preserved remains youll find it actually does
PREHISTORY
Walk amid ancient mountains, fiery volcanoes, glorious geology, and Neolithic remains for an education in the earths formation.
MOUNT RORAIMA
Canaima National Park, Venezuela
Scale Venezuelas prehistoric tabletop mountain via tangled jungle, slippery slopes, and strange endemic species to discover a unique lost world.
Need to know
Point in time: 2 billion years ago (mountain rock first formed)
Length: 56 days
Difficulty: Moderate/strenuous steep; humid and rainy; biting flies
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