When the Process is the Destination: Long-distance Walking as Slow Tourism

Historically, long-distance walking has been used for multiple purposes, and today it may be considered as both a form of tourism and as a mental health intervention. In this chapter, we outline the history of long-distance walking from its religious to its more recent, secular, and popular form, which includes it in the emerging movement known as slow tourism. Afterward, we describe different definitional approaches and perspectives on mental health that long-distance walking is associated with in research. The mental health perspectives we label flow , calmness , and contemplation , where each represents a certain state of mind, which has been associated with long-distance walking. Though these perspectives are distinct, we argue, that the appeal of long-distance walking, and the benefit for mental health, may lie in their co-existence; in what we frame as moving between being, thinking, and doing states of mind. Regarding future perspectives, long-distance walking seems to go against certain imperatives about life in modern society, which are likely to continue, if not grow. We estimate that the research in this field is in its early stages and is likely to grow in the coming years.