Hi all. I've been trying barefooting whenever possible for the last few weeks. It has helped with strengthening my foot and leg muscles--I broke my leg badly last year and am still trying to get the strength back. Here are some of my experiences: - At work: As a science teacher this is very hard--during lab closed toed shoes are necessary as well as expected, but as the school year wound down and we weren't doing hard core labs I could get away with flip-flops, and after school ditched those too. - Hiking: a local university's garden's and woods made for great first time barefoot in nature experiences. Very, very enjoyable, for me and my barepawed dog. -At home: unfortunately the woods on my own land stink for barefooting. This is one thing I have not heard about, but are a major problem--not rocks or branches or glass, but SWEET GUM SEED PODS. My woods are just covered in them and they are just the WORST for barefooting. Oh well. -Work today: Last day of school for teachers: fancy-ish restaurant for department breakfast, end of year faculty meeting, and department picnic. I did flops for the first two and just went to the dept picnic at someone's house barefoot. - Princeton today: I parked on the main street and left my flops behind, walking to the university's fountain in front of the business library to wade and relax and read. Here's the funny part: Later I drove to a crunchy granola tree-hugger natural foods store in Princeton--probably the "crunchiest" store in the state, and decided to wear flops because, after all, it is still Princeton. Well I felt kind of foolish for deciding to be so "formal" when I was in there since one of the male employees stocking the produce, though fully shod, was wearing a sarong! I don't think bare feet would have stood out so much. I'll try it next time. With the hot sun the last few days I've also had trouble with hot asphalt-- not fun when encountered for a significant period of time. Any comments on dealing with sweet gum seed pods, hot asphalt, and "crunchy" stores?
We don't have "sweet gum seed pods" here in the UK. Are they sticky? if so, perhaps rubbing vaseline into your soles may help. As for hot asphalt, only practice will do it!
They're not sticky (actually I have no idea why the trees are called sweet gum). The seed pods are about an inch in diameter, perfect spheres, and have scores of hard spikes all over them - not as sharp as thorns, but damned uncomfortable to walk on, especially if the middle of your sole lands on one. One tree can almost completely cover the area beneath it with pods.
Now i'm really glad we don't have them in the UK! I can't think of any countermeasures except watch your step.
We have those seed pods here in Northern Cal. They don't hurt my feet and it actually feels good crushing them. Just keep up the barefoot walking and soon you'll be able to walk on them too. The only thing that gives me discomfort are puncturevine (aka "goathead") thorns. Them buggers are nasty, and will flatten bike tires and sometimes car tires.
Not sure about the sweet gum seed pods. I've never tried going barefoot in a "crunchy" store, but it ought to be OK. As far as the hot asphalt, it's 90 degrees for the first time this season, and I'm looking for advice myself on that! I'm trying to just keep on goin barefoot to see if my soles toughen up (so I hear they should), but they aren't toughening up quick enough for my comfort! I just hope they toughen up soon so that I can withstand a walk outside.
Sweet gum (Liquidambar styraciflua) (check out this Wikipedia link, it's interesting,) is native to the eastern US from about New York City, SOUTH, thru New Jersey and on down. I can imagine they would be no fun to walk on. I'm surprised they appear to thoroughly occupy your site, and not be mixed with other trees. We obviously don't have them in Maine, but we do have certain kinds of evergreen cones that are hard to walk on. Being barefoot, it's easy to train one's foot falls in between such dangers, including our prolific pointed rocks. As a reward for safely negotiating that, we have intervals of moss and pine needles to treat our feet to. Hopefully nowhereboy , your woods have some oaks, tulip trees, maples, or hickories to walk under too? Although acorns are sometimes no fun to walk on, either. That's a different forest than I have here, 700 miles away, but I know the trees. If you get into leafy stretches, it will feel wonderful to your soles, (and perhaps your soul, too) and then all you have to watch for is the broken sticks which are easy to step around. You'll have fun developing this faculty for safe bare foot navigation, and as the feet toughen up, the almost opposite sensitivity to surface textures (tastes) builds up.
congrats on barefooting in new jersey! i love it, even though i live in a really "city-ish, urban-ish" area. the asphalt does suck sometimes, but your feet will get stronger. what's even worse is that i go to a private high school in manhattan. so i can't be barefooting while commuting, but once i get to school, it's just socks. (freaking disciplinarian won't let us get away with anything.) i've barefooted in manhattan. you just get stares. oh well hope you don't step on anything painful! peace and love, diana
whooo NJ! I know about those pods. They have them all over campus (Willy P) in the spring. I love going barefoot. It's the best. My girlfriend says I'm a "feet" person. Not that I enjoy feet.. but I guess to say that I'm into nature things (being barefoot, rock climbing, outside-ness in general) I walk barefoot down my driveway to get the mail sometimes. It can get really hot, but I guess it isn't so bad if you walk... smoothly. It'll burn but, you kinda get over it in a couple seconds if you keep your weight even. If you run across the pavement, bouncing on your feet, you'll feel like your toes are on fire. Otherwise, I'd suggest walking on pavement once it has cooled for a while to get your soles nice and calloused.
Freaking glass!!! I was so happy to be hiking barefoot today because those sweet gum pods are soft and not so bad when it rains. Well, I went to Rutgers Gardens and a policeman was at the entrance, saying it was closed. Odd, but I intended to go barefoot hiking, so I went to Davidson's Mill Park in south brunswick. I hadn't been there in probably 10 years. After dodging the goose poop in the lawns between the parking lot and the woods entrance I was really looking forward to cool earth. But instead it was very sad. The trails were overgrown and muddy. I meen sinking down to my calves muddy (thank god I didn't have flip flops on... they would still be down in the muck) but the worst part is there was garbage everywhere... and I had my first encounter with BROKEN GLASS. It was a very old broken dirty bottle so it just looked like dirt and I didn't notice it. It wasn't a hideous cut, thank god, but it was bleeding and dirty. I used some water to clean it and hightailed it back to the parking lot and home, where I cleaned it with soap, then alcohol, then iodine solution. It looks and feels okay now and maybe I'll try to see if Rutgers Gardens is open tomorrow. Anyway it's sad that the park is so full of trash... it goes along with the people that have moved into South Brunswick the last 10 years... and why I decided to stop working in their school district recently. Hopefully somerset county (where I'm moving my job and residence to) has nicer barefoot friendly parks.
As you continue to go barefoot your feet will toughen and most of these issues like hot asphalt, glass, etc., become less of a problem. I have to wear boots for work, because of safety reasons (construction), but as soon as I'm done for the Off come the boots and I'm barefoot until returning the next day. Weekends I rarely ever wear any footwear. What's great for those times when you have to wear something on your feet, I have a pair of old worn out mocassins. They have no soles, but cover the tops of my feet. Unless you are really looking at my feet you will not notice my soles are bare. It keeps them tough, and ready for those time when I don't wear anything. Stay barefoot and enjoy.
Hey thanks for the advice. I like the mocassin idea. I wish there was some way to have a fake shirt-- my bf and I went to a restaurant in asbury park, an outdoor restaurant ON the boardwalk RIGHT ACROSS fromt the main beach in the middle of the day, and after being seated we were told we needed SHIRTS. Please. We left. I wonder if we had been barefoot if we would have scolded also. It was the middle of the day and the sand and the boardwalk were EXTREMELY HOT, even worse than asphalt.
Barefootin in The Pinelands is nice. Absence of any sharp stones, just those rounded pebbles. The sand drains quickly with no puddles or mud. Nice beds of pine needles. dip the fet in a cool stream! Double Trouble State Park
