Record-Setting Hiker To Tour NYC Parks On 175-Mile Trek

NEW YORK — As a professional long-distance hiker, Liz Thomas is no stranger to vast stretches of wilderness. In 2011 she traversed the famous 2,181-mile Appalachian Trail in 80 days and 13 hours, a record time for a self-supported woman.

But the 33-year-old Thomas said much smaller pieces of land helped cultivate the love of nature that she's grown into a career.

"It wasn’t these grand national parks that turned me into the outdoors person I am now," said Thomas, who grew up in Sacramento, California. "It’s going to my local park 10 minutes away that made me feel comfortable on grass or on trees or playing in a creek."

Thomas will set off Wednesday on a nine-day urban hike that she hopes will give her a better understanding of the role such local parks play in New York City.

The 175-mile trek will take her to about 100 parks and playgrounds across the five boroughs in neighborhoods from Harlem to East Flatbush.

Along the way, Thomas will be meeting with people in the local communities who helped shape the parks that she will visit. While she'll hop on a ferry to Staten Island, she said her goal is to stay out of cars for the whole trip.

"Part of the thing about walking someplace instead of driving places is this idea of being able to process a landscape and appreciate it," said Thomas, a Los Angeles area resident. "And I think that goes really in line with sort of this philosophy behind walking, is taking the time to understand the ideas and the motivations and design of a place."

Thomas's journey across the city is just her latest urban hike. She's made similar expeditions through western cities such as Seattle, San Francisco and Denver, where she she said she walked to all the breweries within city limits.

This one is a partnership between Thomas and the Trust for Public Land, which built all the parks she will be visiting out of vacant lots. They're all part of the trust's 10-Minute Walk program, which aims to ensure everyone has a park within a 10-minute walk from home.

Some 99% of New York City residents already live that close to a park, according to the trust. Thomas's hike points out that those spaces are "an essential resource in our city for exercise, recreation, and finding community," Carter Strickland, the organization's New York and New Jersey director.

"Liz knows how to navigate the most remote, wild places on earth. Traveling to our neighborhood parks and playgrounds she’ll show New Yorkers that, even in one of the busiest cities in the world, they too can connect with nature no more than a 10 minute walk from home," Strickland said in a statement.

Unlike her wildnerness hikes, Thomas said she doesn't have to carry a big food supply or a tent on her urban journeys. Instead she'll be staying with friends, people associated with the Trust for Public Land and in some Airbnbs while she's in the Big Apple.

New York is a special place for city hiking because it already has an "urban exploration culture," Thomas said. A group from the Appalachian Mountain Club is expected to join her on the hike on Saturday, she said.

"There’s a walking culture here for people who aren’t hiking or urban exploring," Thomas said. "It’s just how people get around."

While wilderness and urban hikes have their differences, Thomas said they both present an opportunity for "processing the world at two or three miles per hour."

"I think in both cases you can get this source of a walking meditation," she said. "In the city you have to work it a little bit harder to get to that spot, but it’s certainly a place that I can get to."