Top 10 Thursday: Top 10 Natural Workouts Of The World
By admin
Before I get started with today’s post, I have to say Happy Birthday to my brother. He’s turned big 33 today. If you remember me talking about my upcoming birthday, we are just 2 days apart. Well, 4 years 2 days.
Us with my Grandmama (ages ~6 & 2)… all grown up with a family of his own!
Does anyone else practically share a birthday with their sibling(s)?
Today’s Top 10 Thursday was a lot of fun, and I have to say interesting to put together. Let’s face it, gyms are expensive so wouldn’t it be great if we could have easy access to natural “gyms” each day?
You know wake up, walk out the door and be able to head out to any of the following places for a great butt kicking sweat feast?
These are the places that I hope to one day visit and experience for myself! Forget hitting a treadmill inside a stuffy, humid gym.
Top 10 Natural Gyms Of The World
Kalavantin Durg
This is one hell of a stair step workout! Kalavantin Durg is a hill fort located in India with a summit is at a height of 2330 ft. The steps are crazy steep and climb about 800-900 feet up before the adventure turns into a vertical climb.
Talk about a butt burner! But I can only imagine the views from the top.
Great Wall Of China
Did you know there is actually a “Great Wall Trek”… for 5 days, grab a backpack and hike/run/walk the Great Wall.
According to the website:
What I loved most is that the site plainly states:
“… the challenge is hard, due to the amount of steps we trek up and down each day – it can sometimes take an hour just to trek 1km…”
Interested? I sure as heck am! The price is just $ 529 which to be honest I don’t think is that bad considering that most 5Ks cost over $ 35.
Strait Of Gibraltar
Why not swim from one continent to another? Looking for cheap transportation from Spain to Africa… throw on a swim suite and swim! I mean from above, it doesn’t look like that far of a swim.
I’ve heard of this swim before so you can imagine my surprise when I learned that less than 500 people have actually been successful.
High boat traffic, fog, currents and of course the long swim (7.8 nautical miles) makes it quite the swim challenge. But hey, it sure has heck sounds better than swimming laps in a pool. I h.a.t.e. lap swimming.
Climb Manoa Falls
Sure doing pull-ups and rows is awesome but why not get our hands dirty and go climbing? More specifically climb a 150 ft water fall… in Hawaii.
Manoa Falls was the back drop for several scenes of Lost and Jurassic Park, that’s reason enough for me to go shimmy up the side. To be honest, I am not sure if rock climbing is allowed or not, but it should be!
Pyramid Of The Sun
My favorite workouts are those that are tush and leg intensive so it’s only appropriate that I discover more than 1 killer step workout. The Pyramid In The Sky is the 3rd largest pyramid in the world, with a height of 233.5 feet and a side angle of 32.5-degrees.
Considering that I complain about the Cooper River Bridge having an slops of just 6-degrees, I am pretty sure I would feel the “burn” immediately.
Great Barrier Reef Swim
Seriously, there is a 3km swim around the Great Barrier Reef!
While that in itself is pretty awesome, what would motivate me to kick my legs and stroke my arms fast would be the fear of sharks around me. That fear would make me successful in completing the race! Though I don’t know if it would allow me to actually take in the beauty of the reef.
If you’re curious, the race is in October this year.
Are you afraid of sharks?
Mount Washington Snow Climb
I love doing mountain climbers in the gym but how much do they really resemble mountain climbing? I mean, if I want to say I do mountain climbers, I should really do them! There is a “Ski To The Clouds” 10K snow showing mountain climb where participants climb more than 2200 vertical feet just in the final 6km! Do you know how much of a total body workout you would get by climbing around in snow? Wowza is all I can say!
Just in case you’re wondering Mt Washington is in New Hampshire (I didn’t know).
Key West Island Hopping
I have a dream of getting into paddleboarding. It just hasn’t happened yet. S when I started to research for this post I knew I wanted to paddleboard somewhere… why not around Key West for the Key West Paddleboard Classic?
12 miles, with nothing but a board and a paddle… sounds like a great way to burn off some calories, kill my core and make my shoulders beg for mercy. Don’t thing that any row machine in my gym will give me that same satisfaction.
O’Surfing With The Irish
My husband loves to surf and it’s my goal for him to see some of the best waves in the world being surfed (or perhaps one day he’ll surf them himself)… I bet you didn’t know that Ireland has some killer waves? Since we’re Irish and all this is the gym workout I want. Okay, so I’ll paddle around the shore on the board in a double layered wet suite, but you have to agree it would be so cool to at least see!
Everest
I can’t leave this off and I don’t feel I need to say much about it. Climbing Everest would be the workout of a lifetime and I would love to wake up one day and be able to tackle it! The pre-programed workout on the treadmill entitled “Everest” just doesn’t cut it!
And that’s a wrap!
If you could do ANYTHING besides going to the gym, what would it be?
SOURCES:
http://www.terrainspotter.com/kalavantin-durg-step-it-up.html
http://www.globaladventurechallenges.com/international/great-wall-trek/
http://www.everytrail.com/guide/manoa-falls
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyramid_of_the_Sun
http://www.heronisland.com/oceanswims12.aspx
http://www.swim2africa.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=82&Itemid=152
http://free-extras.com/images/mount_washington-12039.htm
http://www.fla-keys.com/news/news.cfm?sid=8368
http://surfmusic.blogsome.com/2007/04/02/everybodys-secret-spot-ireland/
http://surfmusic.blogsome.com/2007/04/02/everybodys-secret-spot-ireland/