Inspiring quotes

Here are some of our favorite quotes about travel--which apply to hiking as well:

“Traveling – it leaves you speechless, then turns you into a storyteller.” from Ibn Battuta, the remarkable Arab who toured the known world 1200 years ago.

“We travel not to escape life, but for life not to escape us.” – Anonymous

“The man who goes alone can start today; but he who travels with another must wait till that other is ready.” – A great line that explains why large groups always travel slower, by Henry David Thoreau, who supposedly was roughing at Walden Pond. But his sister brought him fresh baked cookies every day...

“Travel and change of place impart new vigor to the mind.” – Seneca

“Not all those who wander are lost.” – J.R.R. Tolkien. And we've wandered many times, on our trips.

“It is not down in any map; true places never are.” – Herman Melville--which is just the excuse you need to get off-trail and explore a little bit.

And an all-time favorite from Mark Twain: “Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.”

I still like my sig line the best, although I now have to stick to easy trails. It's from Ed Abbeu's preface to Desert Solitaire, IMHO the finest piece of nature writing since Thoreau's Walden. In fact, better--frankly, I found Walden rather boring.

So I know this thread is kind of old, but I love quotes! These were great! Some of my favorite travel quotes are:

"Travel far enough, you meet yourself." - Cloud Atlas
"Travel is the only thing you buy that makes you richer."
"Fill your life with adventure, not things. Have stories to tell, not things to show."

At times I think that people who feel that they've invented a quote have in fact just paraphrased something that they read or heard before, but forgotten about. So in that context I can't swear that I'm the author of this, but I think that I am (?) --- anyway, I don't recall hearing it elsewhere:

Sometimes you need to listen to your body. Sometimes you need to tell it to shut [the hell] up. Trail wisdom is knowing the difference between the two.


Of course this isn't limited to just backpacking, but I've found it particularly apt in that context!

My own favorite is from Yogi: "When you come to a fork in the road, take it." Leads to some interesting trips.

Colin Flectcher always included several pages of quotes in his Complete Walker books.

A quick Google search says that it's yours, Brian...

I am an UL backpacker. When I was backpacking the skyline trail is Jasper Alberta I ran into a girl that had an 8 liter pack stuffed to the gills. I said " thats a huge pack" and she replied with the common phrase "go big or go home" lol I thought it was pretty clever of her to respond like that

Balzaccom: thanks!

Todd: On the PCT a friend and I hiked for a while with a college-aged girl who had literally never even camped out overnight before she set out to thru-hike the PCT. Her trailname: "Go Big". I hiked with her in northern California; by that point at least, she had definitely figured out how to do it!

"Life begins at the end of your comfort zone" - attributed to Neale Donald Walsch, has always been a favorite.