Waterloo man walks every street in K-W
Posted Dec 20, 2019 08:30:00 PM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Matt Wilson covered a lot of ground in 2019.
The Waterloo man walked every street in Kitchener and Waterloo. He also made it to some streets in Woolwich Township, Breslau and St. Jacobs.
“Every block of every street. So circling around courts and walking to dead ends and lots of turning around to cover literally everything.” said Wilson.
He got the idea after receiving an email from a friend about a documentary – The World Before Your Feet – in which Matt Green has been walking every street in New York City, logging over 8,000 miles so far.
“So I sat on it for a couple of weeks, then 2019 rolled around and I thought let's go out and do this.” explained Wilson.
Wilson then started his year long journey with a map of the region from 2017.
“The first walk was about three kilometres … very short. Was very tired afterward (laughs). My walking fitness definitely improved over the course of the year. And after that … would take a glance at the map, kind of pick out what I thought may be a good route and work my way through it.” he told The Mike Farwell Show on 570 NEWS.
He admits sometimes it did feel like a chore, especially having to battle the rain, snow and cold, “I learned pretty quickly that I did not want to walk in anything less than negative 10,”
What did he learn from the almost 2,000 km he covered by foot?
“There's so much to see here. There's a lot more wildlife than I expected. I saw the fireflies we are so fortunate to have kind of come back to the region in July. I saw a fairly well known, apparently, family of wild turkeys … everyone I talked to said 'I see them around all the time!” – they live in north Waterloo.” said Wilson. “You appreciate a lot of the architecture. I liked looking for the old farmhouses that have since been integrated into some of the new neighbourhoods … You definitely appreciate just how much this area has to offer and how many sort of little communities there are within a larger community.”
Wilson says one of his favourite walks was on Ferndale Place in Waterloo, “Really nice, old mature trees – older subdivision. It has these sort of fancy 1800s Britain style lamp posts. It's just a really nice community … I walked it in the winter too on a really cold night and even then it was picturesque, I really loved that street. But the truth is there are so many streets and so many neighbourhoods that are just gorgeous … definitely encourage people to maybe take a different route home from work sometime and try and experience something new.”
“You definitely appreciate just how much this area has to offer and how many sort of little communities there are within a larger community.” added Wilson.
