What Defines a "Hike"?

On July 21^st, a group of five of us headed to Eden Park set in the hills above downtown Cincinnati. This was one of those places that we asked ourselves, “Why did Tammy York include this location in a book about hiking?” We had a great time and we saw lots of cool things, but it was a paved walk around and about a city park. It really made me ponder, “What defines a 'hike'?” We “hiked” 3.37 miles in 1 hour and 23 minutes. The temperature was ­­a refreshing 73 degrees.

After parking the car near the Cincinnati Art Museum we headed down the hill on the sidewalk along the park road towards Mirror Lake. The day was so pretty with blue skies and big puffy white clouds. Just like the name implies, the reflections in the water of the sky above were so beautiful. I’m sure the pictures on this blog page are too small to even get an idea of how pretty the scenery was. We walked around Mirror Lake taking in the large fountain in the middle and stopping to watch a mama duck with her ducklings (they really looked like teenagers, they weren’t very small, but they were cute.) At one end of the lake was a huge gazebo and we went past it to Hinkle Floral Trail and the Krohn Conservatory.  (Hinkle Floral “Trail” is a sidewalk through a short span of woods.)

We didn’t stop to take time to visit the conservatory (we were on a hike, remember?), but we enjoyed all of the plants and flowers decorating the outside of the building. At the conservatory we crossed the street to a set of stairs that led up to the Presidential Grove where trees are planted in dedication to the U.S. Presidents. The big old trees were beautiful and the sidewalk wound its way to an old brick water tower that we walked around before heading down towards the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. The memorial is a metal sculpture of two army soldiers. We only spent a couple of minutes here before we headed across the street again to another part of the park with a beautiful view overlooking the Ohio River. We stopped to take a break, listen to Lorrie’s questions and I tried to take pictures of everyone. Ryan and Morgan kept running away from the camera. There is a pond with lots of pretty landscaping and a bridge going over the water in this part of the park. Morgan and Ryan decided to do a little jogging, but were almost attacked by geese that were guarding one edge of the water.

This was the halfway point of the “hike”. We headed back toward the water tower, down the stairs, past Krohn Conservatory, and through the Hinkle Floral “Trail” (paved) to Mirror Lake again. This time Joe joined Ryan and Morgan and they ran together all the way around the lake (a much longer distance.) I was impressed and they had a good feeling of accomplishment. At this point the map led us along the sidewalks to a different park road and we took some steep steps back up toward the Art Museum and my car. This was the closest part of the outing that felt like a hike to me because we walked on dirt for about 10 feet. We ended the hike with one of our favorite sites of the day, a flying pig sculpture called "Shark Girl on Pig."

So, I want to put this question out to the readers. What defines a “hike”? Does this sound like a “hike” to you? Please help me think about this on my quest to becoming an experienced hiker.

I LOVE Eden Park! We had a great time. It was a beautiful day and there was so much to see.  This was “hike” number 38 – 22 hikes to go!!!!