It’s different to walk in a city than in nature.

The city has to make sense. It’s built by human, for human. Every bit of it serves a purpose or at least has served a purpose. To walk in the city, understanding it, is to make sense of the history of the city and the people who contributed to its existence, and to ponder how you, as an individual, can mutate the city into the future.

Therefore, it’s invigorating to walk in the city. It’s reaching out to you, connecting you to its past and welcoming you into its future.

It’s futile to make sense of nature. Nature is what it is. Nature is immutable; it doesn’t care how you try to mutate it. You can’t fight something that doesn’t try to stop you.

So it’s humbling to walk in nature. You feel nothing in the grand scheme, and sometimes that’s exactly what you need. It’s one of the best gifts of Vancouver with its proximity to nature.