Late last year I had the honor of participating in a seven-day, 100-kilometer “Walk and Talk” across northern Thailand. Organized by futurist Kevin Kelly and writer-photographer Craig Mod, a “Walk and Talk” mixes long-distance hiking during the day with an in-depth, one-topic-per-night “Jeffersonian conversation” over dinner each evening.
Our ten hand-picked participants, strangers to each other at the outset, took turns introducing philosophical topics to discuss. Overnight luggage was forwarded during the day, which meant we hiked carrying only day packs. This allowed everyone to focus on conversing, enjoying the “side-by-side intimacy” of the shared trek as each day played out.
I loved the unplugged physical/intellectual intentionality of the endeavor, and I hope to create my own curated Walk and Talks (in places like France, Kenya, and Kansas) in the future.
For information on how to organize your own Walk and Talk, check out Craig Mod’s “The Walk and Talk: Everything We Know.” For field reports from our 2023 Thailand Walk and Talk, check out Mod’s “Walking the Heck out of Thailand,” Liz Danzico’s “Expanding Home,” or Jason Kottke’s “Where Do You Call Home?” or Derek Sivers’ “Walk and Talk.”
My field-reported podcast episode about the experience, “Walk and Talk: Notes from a peripatetic salon across northern Thailand,” debuted in April of 2024.
Note: “Dispatches” are short vignettes, profiles, and mini-essays written and posted from the road, often in tandem with my Instagram account. I don’t host a “comments” section, but I’m happy to hear your thoughts via my Contact page.
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