Are we hiking or bushwalk?

[GPSGuided]

OT, but I wondered if dogs experience phantom pains on their lost tail?

[metastable]

I use "bushwalking", but I thought I'd survey our local retailers and manufacturers for their usage.

Paddy Pallin seems to hedge their bets. The site has Hiking as a main section http://www.paddypallin.com.au/equipment/hiking.html but within that has a blurb talking about bushwalkers

Mountain Designs sells "Hiking Packs" http://www.mountaindesigns.com/store/pa ... and-alpine

Wilderness Equipment sell Backpacks, but Hiking tents http://www.wildequipment.com.au/

One Planet sell Rucksacks for Bushwalking http://www.oneplanet.com.au/rucksacks.html

Clear as mud

[JoshT]

I've grown up (or at least older) as a Scout, and we generally use the term bushwalk to mean a single day walk, and anything overnight with packs becomes a hike. Not sure why it's that way, could be the English/American influence in the history of Scouting. I usually tell the kids we're going exploring.

[Travis22]

Bushwalk - day trip.
Hiking - overnight trips.

Travis.

[ILUVSWTAS]

What's the name of this website....?????

Case closed.

[Allchin09]

The answer to this question lies in what you are actually doing. The term 'bushwalk' was invented when naming the Sydney Bush Walkers in order to differentiate the activity which the club undertakes, from that of hiking. Bushwalking and hiking were originally two similar, but different activities, however they seemed to be used interchangeably these days.

[stry]

Bushwalk - day trip.
Hiking - overnight trips.

Travis.

Other way round History (and grey hair) supports my view

[stry]

What's the name of this website....?????

Case closed.

May I open the case to agree ?

[ILUVSWTAS]

What's the name of this website....?????

Case closed.

May I open the case to agree ?

Of course prosecutor.

[jacko1956]

For me it's definitely hiking when I have a pack. A bushwalk isn't necessarily on a marked trail and is more of a stroll through bush with no set goals or targets.

[Strider]

For me it's definitely hiking when I have a pack. A bushwalk isn't necessarily on a marked trail and is more of a stroll through bush with no set goals or targets.

Trail? Or track?

[ILUVSWTAS]

For me it's definitely hiking when I have a pack. A bushwalk isn't necessarily on a marked trail and is more of a stroll through bush with no set goals or targets.

Trail? Or track?

Arghhhhhh TRACK!!!!!!

[johnw]

For me it's definitely hiking when I have a pack. A bushwalk isn't necessarily on a marked trail and is more of a stroll through bush with no set goals or targets.

Trail? Or track?

Arghhhhhh TRACK!!!!!!

I agree Mark but don't ever go to the USA, you'll explode

[jacko1956]

Trail or track - depends on the name given to it. I talk mostly with friends in the USA so use trail mostly when typing. Habit. I walked the Bib Track and the Appalachian Trail. What really pisses me off is when government departments talk about wildfires. The word "bush" is sacrosanct. Even when I hike on a trail, if I'm in Australia it's in the bush.

[corvus]

Woohoo who really cares as long as we get out there EH!!
corvus

[dplanet]

Agree. If interested, click on the link, a short video UTube http://youtu.be/0dkeu38iwN8

[ILUVSWTAS]

Arghhhhhh TRACK!!!!!!

I agree Mark but don't ever go to the USA, you'll explode [/quote]


Haha I know John, but if I was in their country i'd TRY to respect the local cultures.... however I wish they'd do the same here.

[CFPhillips]

Hey all, I was recently looking at Google Trends regarding 'hiking' versus 'bushwalking and 'tramping' and discovered there's been a definite decline in usage for local terms in the past decade (online at least).

For those that want to see my research, you can find it here: http://wild.com.au/people/opinion/adven ... shwalking/

Certainly this is something more salient for anyone running a business that relates to wilderness adventure.

[Allchin09]

CFPhillips - I enjoyed your article, but one thing you may want to correct is the number of average weekly searches you quote for each term. The numbers given aren't the number of times that is has been searched in a week, but normalised to fit between 0 and 100. IE the most popular has 100 and those with not enough data 0. To suggest that bushwalking was only searched on average twice per day in 2014 is far from the truth. The numbers are only relative and should be used comparatively. See https://support.google.com/trends/answer/4355164?hl=en

[CFPhillips]

Thanks for the feedback, A. Glad you're more adept at wading through Google's finer print than I am!

[rollingk]

I think the word bushwalk is only used in Australia, not elsewhere. I grew up thinking referring to the activity as hike/hiking. I first hear the word bushwalk when I came to Australia and now I use it interchangeably.

So hiking/bushwalking to me its the same thing just one is used globally (?) and another only in a country. This is proved by the fact the auto correct in in the reply box is suggesting the word bushwalk/bushwalking to be incorrect. I guess it belongs to Australian dictionary, just like the 'z' and 's' of US/UK.

[perfectlydark]

I use them both too although not sure If i have any particular vocab rules.around it. An overnighter feels more like a hike whereas a daywalk i almost always refer to as a bushwalk

[oxyiscool]

I bushwalk mostly although will usually hike to a canyon. If it is super hard going I tend to say hike, I don't know why that has developed. After tramping in NZ I would say I prefer that term over all others. And it is either on a track or you are bush bashing. Trail does not seem to fit in Aus for me.

[izogi]

Hey all, I was recently looking at Google Trends regarding 'hiking' versus 'bushwalking and 'tramping' and discovered there's been a definite decline in usage for local terms in the past decade (online at least). For those that want to see my research, you can find it here: http://wild.com.au/people/opinion/adven ... shwalking/

Thanks, that's really interesting.

I'm from the kiwi side of the ditch, and although you've noted that New Zealanders are still clinging to 'tramping', there certainly seems to have been a gradual introduction of 'hiking' to the local vocabulary, probably much related to all the recent tourism from the USA, and from European countries where people have often picked up the more common Americanisms for speaking in English. It's not uncommon these days to see local media refer to 'hiking', and tourism-related businesses also use it frequently, but I think sometimes 'tramping' also gets coverage simply because visitors see it as the sort of thing you're meant to "do" when you come here, almost as if it's a novelty in itself that's somehow different.

In the end, even 'tramping' has been around, and closely identifiable with recreational back-country walking, for about a century. Before that, the terminology in use was more ambiguous. Language evolves, I guess, but I like the localisms.

[perfectlydark]

You have to remember when searching for gear online its much more effective to search say 'hiking tents' than 'bushwalking tents'

[CFPhillips]

That's certainly the point I was making in my article... at least partially. The simplification of language for the commercial interests of brands via Google seems to be having an actual impact on our local terminology. I find it interesting that younger people now tend to prefer the term hiking, while older people still see bushwalking as the more accurate (at least that's the feeling I'm getting from these comments and from those on our Facebook page on the topic). However, this latter phenomenon is unlikely to have resulted purely from Google's influence, but also from the general influence of US culture in Australia (in my opinion, anyway).

Last edited by CFPhillips on Mon 16 Mar, 2015 12:55 pm, edited 1 time in total.

[wallwombat]

At school in the 1980s we referred to it as hiking. Nowadays, I refer to it as bushwalking.

I'd never really given it much thought until I read this thread.

I'm not sure I'm going to give it much thought from now on either.

[mikethepike]

Interesting that Wild brought up this topic in its latest edition.

[CFPhillips]

Hi Mike,

Thanks for checking out our latest issue.

You can find an extended version of the story on our website (I posted the link in a previous comment, I think), which was released prior to the magazine becoming available. I began looking into this topic after undertaking some research via Google Trends. It was only after <i>Wild</i> had published this first online version of the story was this forum topic pointed out to me by a reader.

Feel free to contact me directly if you would like to see more of the Google search term data.

[Arnold]

I thought bushwalk was used moreso when talking about a day walk in the bush, whereas a hike implied at least one night.