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You're listening to Life Kit from NPR. Andy Taggle here in for Mary Al Segara.

Hiking has some pretty particular branding here in the US.

In my mind's eye, I see a seasoned athlete in muddy hiking boots at the peak of a mountain top.

Arms outstretched and fancy hiking poles sunk

down in victory, maybe a great big backpack filled with gear slung atop a bright puffy jacket, and a face looking

down at a just conquered valley below.

If any of that imagery feels familiar to you,

it makes sense why hiking can often seem like this intense, expensive,

inaccessible activity.

Which has always been so weird to me since it's quite literally the freest thing we have.

We have access to it everywhere.

Amanda Machado is a writer and facilitator based in Oakland, California. Their work explores how race, gender, power, and identity

affect the way we travel and experience the outdoors. Growing up, Amanda says she was always

outdoorsy, climbing things, scraping their knees, but she wasn't introduced to the more formal world of outdoor recreation until they went to college.

And though it was something they loved, as a Latino, she always found herself grappling with a feeling that hiking, outdoor spaces often felt closed off in some ways.

Not meant for her.

But then they spent six weeks backpacking through Ecuador, the

country her father's from. Though they'd visited her father's hometown before,

...