the.com/trekking

voluntarily paying to walk uphill until your legs and your worldview both shift.

means Going on a long, strenuous journey on foot, typically over rough or wild terrain and often for several days at a stretch.

from A gift from Afrikaans, where trek meant a journey or migration by ox-wagon — the slow, grinding hauls of the Voortrekkers who packed up and rolled into the South African interior. The word goes back to Dutch trekken, 'to pull, draw, march,' the same tugging sense that drags a draught animal forward. English borrowed it in the 1800s for any arduous overland slog, and the doubled-up 'trekking' came along for the verb.

origin word
From Afrikaans 'trek,' meaning an arduous ox-wagon journey.
high stakes
Everest Base Camp trek tops 17,000 feet.
slow speed
Multi-day treks average just 2 miles per hour.
side effect
Altitude can suppress appetite while burning thousands of calories.
longest
Nepal's Great Himalaya Trail spans roughly 1,000 miles.
for instance

everest base camp trek — 14-day route in nepal attracting ~40,000 trekkers annually to 5,364m

inca trail — 4-day trek to machu picchu in peru, limited to 500 hikers per day

kilimanjaro climb — 5-7 day trek on tanzania's 5,895m volcano, ~50,000 annual summits

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