Hiking Diaries: Part One

 Hi, and welcome to my little corner of the internet! I've never written a blog before in my life -- I usually stick to Insta posts -- so bear with me. 

For t
hose of you who don't already know, my name is Danielle and I've always had a passion for hiking, nature, and really anything that involves the outdoors. Over the last couple years, I've explored some incredible trails, seen new places, and even experienced a major setback in the form of a pretty bad knee injury while out on a hike a few years ago. But despite my knee injury, hiking has overall been a great experience for me. Not only is it a great way to stay active but it's also an even better way to disconnect from everything and get some peace and quiet (I know, that sounds very cliche. But it's true!)

You might be wondering how I got into hiking in the first place.  I come from an outdoorsy family so it's always something I've been exposed to, but I never really did much hiking/outdoor activities on my own until my freshman year of college. 

When I got to Bradley as a freshman, I had no friends. And I mean absolutely zero friends. I've always been pretty shy around new people, but as a freshman here I was practically a mute. Super socially awkward and never even attempted to try and talk to people in class. Didn't help that I was a commuter my first semester so I couldn't even make friends with people on my floor. Quite frankly, it sucked. I remember getting out of an accounting class on a sunny day in September and walking along the quad, seeing everyone laughing and having fun with all their friends and there I was all by myself. I was already having a bad day since I'd bombed an accounting test and seeing everyone running around with their friends when I had nothing to do and no one to hang out with just made it worse.  I ended up getting in my car and going for a drive to just get away from campus, and I wound up at a local nature preserve in Peoria (Forest Park Nature Center). I didn't intend to spend very long out on the trails, but I guess nature had other plans. Before I knew it, I'd spent the remainder of my day hiking to the top of a bluff in the park and taking in the scenic view and feeling the sun on my face. I also got to see a doe and her faun. Suddenly, my failed accounting test and lack of friends seemed very unimportant and far away. And that's when my love for hiking was born :) 

You might be wondering if I'm still a social recluse with no friends, and if I ever passed that accounting class. Thankfully I managed to come out of my shell after a nice girl in my accounting class invited me (coerced me) into joining her sorority that spring. Joining was the best decision I've made in my life and that nice girl from accounting has been my best friend for the past three years. She and I both also passed that accounting class! 

Despite the fact that I made a bunch of friends and life generally improved for me since that day at Forest Park Nature Center, my love for hiking never went away. Pretty soon, I moved on from the easy hikes at the nature center to a lot more challenging areas...but those are posts for another day.