Where is the risk in going out for country walks?

[OatMilkAddict]

I've been very careful to limit social interaction (apart from food shopping once per week for me and elderly family members isolating elsewhere), but I have been out walking for an hour or two most days since lockdown.
I head on foot to secluded woods and fields where I only rarely see people (and give them a wide berth if I do). I don't touch a thing while I'm out, nor sit down or brush against anything. As soon as I get home, I remove my shoes and wash my hands, phone and keys.
Without being goady, I am curious to hear from the most vehement "stay at home" advocates precisely how my daily walk is going to get me (or anyone else) sick, because I literally don't understand where the risk is!

Ah, so by ‘blanket ban’ you meant one of those metaphorical blanket bans?

I had a similar thread OP. Most people agreed that it's advisable to get out for exercise each day, within the guidelines. However, one poster did state that me and anyone who agreed with me should not be entitled to NHS treatment

@Sobeyondthehills

Yes, it is, some of it. There are a few posters who post their own imaginary version of the rules over and over again. It doesn't matter how many times someone shows them the actual HMGov website, they carry on, again and again. The same posters. This is not just fear and anxiety, it isn't because their only source and reading matter is SM, it isn't even the Daily Mail et al. It has become something more than that, it is now a compulsion and it is disordered.

I have every sympathy with anxious people. There are now many threads here on MN from people who suffer from poor mental health and who are genuinely afraid (and in some cases suicidal) to go outside to exercise because they are too worried that they will a/ kill someone or b/ be judged.

In times like these that old WW2 saying has become so, so true. "Careless talk costs lives"

So those who are compulsively unable to stop posting their imaginary. incorrect version of their 'Rules' need pulling up, every time.

Wow a lot of responses to this post! Thank you. Glad to see that many of you are reading from the same page as me. Some aren't though, and it's these people who I just don't understand:

@JudgeRindersMinder, I said very clearly I don't touch anything when I'm out. No gateposts, no fences, no stiles, nothing. Only my front door when I come home and I wash my hands and my keys as soon as I get inside.

@WhatchaMaCalllit - did you actually read my post?
If you're told to stay home, do just that.
I have been told I'm allowed to take my usual exercise once a day
If you're told to exercise within 2km of your home, do just that. Don't drive to a picturesque part of the country to do your exercise, stay close to home.
I haven't been told to stay within 2km of home as I live in the UK and there is no official limit apart from the suggestion of "close to home" - but actually I probably do stay within 2km (or very nearly so). I clearly said in my opening post that I WALK from home and don't drive.
If you're told to wash your hands more frequently, do just that.
I do, as soon as I get home, even though as I clearly explained in my OP I don't touch anything while I'm out.
It's not rocket science but it is manageable and if you insist on driving somewhere to take your exercise, you're screwing it up for the rest of us. Have some consideration for others.
I do, and as I clearly said, I'm NOT DRIVING ANYWHERE. If I see people while I'm out, I change direction or take another track (pretty easy in a wood or open country).

In fact, I am actually further from other human beings and less likely to catch something when I'm away from the house than in my postage-stamp garden where the three kids next door spend most of their time bouncing on their trampoline and breathing heavily into my garden.
You're being exactly the kind of hysterical poster I was talking about. Why are you telling me off? I haven't broken any rules or done anything that will put me or anyone else at risk.
If the government introduces tighter restrictions, I will abide by them. But at the moment they haven't. I know I am fortunate to live where I do on the very edge of a large city. Don't make me feel guilty about doing the things I am allowed to do and can do without risk to me, my family or others.

I think you have to work it case by case. I can step out my back door onto a deserted field. Some regular walkers though are finding that their previously deserted routes are now full of people taking their daily exercise making social distancing impossible.

Given that hypertension is a risk factor, it could be that posting about country walks on MN is a riskier activity (for both the OP and the rule-inventors) than actually just using your local knowledge and commonsense and getting on with it.

WTF. So walking in the country is dangerous because you might touch a gate- I.e. people who live in the country shouldn’t go on walks. This is turning into utter batshit madness.

It also assumes gates/stiles etc when there are vast swathes of countryside without any. I can let my dog have a good run up in the local fields (not farmer owned) every day without touching anything and I can think of miles and miles of similar land.

If the advice yesterday was to limit your exercise to 1 hour a day. Depending on how fast you walk, I'm guessing that works out at about a mile and a half from your home.

That's if walking a mile takes on average about 20 minutes ?

I walk at a bit more than 5km (~3miles) per hour if I'm not pushing it (short legs, 59). Someone larger/younger/fitter could easily do 4 mph.

Yes Errol.

I suppose it depends how used to walking someone is and also the terrain. If an area is flat or hilly

I'm in my 50s and have always liked to walk a lot, especially in summer. I reckon I can walk about 4 miles an hour round trip. Maybe a little bit more

@Flaxmeadow the actual coronavirus act does not say 1 hour a day, it doesn't even say just once a day. There is a disconnect between what government (Gove) is saying and what the actual act says. You'd think they'd all try and sing from the same song sheet.

Those were my speeds on the flat. Hills considerably slower, in part because DH has to go quite slowly downhill (knees). And if I could hillwalk at the moment I'd be going very cautiously too (would take two poles apiece instead of the usual one). This is not the time for a sprain or worse! But, we live on the flat so for now we can see some hills but not get to them.

I think the legislation isn't prescriptive because in the real world one size doesn't fit all. The various statements are presumably meant as guidelines of what's generally likely to be reasonable.

longearbat

The advice yesterday was an hour exercise?

The legislation is very general because it's written for people who live in flats in crowded cities through to people who own a few acres.
Having a different rule for urban/rural areas won't work because it will drive people to visit the area with the laxer rule.
You're perfectly fine to do what you are doing now.

But that was just an off the cuff remark when put on the spot not what the law says.

It wasn't official advice that should be taken prescriptively.

I am fortunate to live on the edge of a common and be very close to some large open spaces. However, it's a grazed common so there are fences and gates. I've been opening the bridleway gates with my elbow and the pedestrian gates using a stick to push the flip-lock open. I would never touch a gate with my bare hands, as you never know who might have touched it previously!

I mean, the only reason people can go on these long several-hour walks and not see anyone (not just OP, I've seen so many people 'just enjoying their daily walk through town' and posting pictures of empty town squares) is because other people are isolating and keeping away unless essential. I personally haven't seen the government guideline as 'you MUST take one walk a day' but as 'if you have to, you can take one walk a day'.

Other people being more strict with themselves is the reason it's so empty outside for a particular few to take a leisurely stroll that's not vital for their health.

I know people will disagree with me and call me a fascist or whatever but I don't see what the harm is in trying to reduce exposure as much as possible. How hard is it??

That's really not the case in a lot of places which are rural but not nice enough to be attractive to people from elsewhere. Lack of others on local paths is the norm, we're avoiding them at weekends now but in the week they're the same as ever.

Empty town squares are obviously a completely different case, you're right about them.

Where I would disagree with that maybelou is the idea that exercise is some luxurywe all have a moral duty to avoid right now.

I don't think that's at all true, and the reason that 'going out to exercise' specifically IS in the guidelines and in the law is because of the benefits to physical and mental health it gives. The government does not want the country to come out of lockdown only to find that it's got a ton more health problems to deal with because everyone's been sat on their sofa getting increasingly inactive and anxious, even more so than lockdown is going to cause already.

But that was just an off the cuff remark when put on the spot not what the law says.

It was advice from our government. But some people think it doesn't apply to them for some reason

Can anyone post where the law says that you can't drive for exercise.

It's fine.

It is not written down anywhere in official regulations or guidance that exercise should be limited to one hour. There is no time limit.