Walking and drinking water go hand-in-hand as ways to boost your wellbeing - and National Walking Month UK aims to get more people on the move. Throughout May, families are encouraged to pull on their walking shoes and step out onto the nation's streets to improve their health.
Get moving to feel better - and cut pollution
Living Streets, the charity behind the campaign, aims to get more people out of their cars and using their feet to get around instead to cut help pollution and improve health and wellbeing. Living Streets says walking every day can:
- Boost your metabolism and burn calories
- Improve blood pressure and the health of your heart
- Be a good way to boost your mood
- Make you more aware of the community around you
To this end National Walking Month has launched the initiative #Try20 to encourage people to get out for a 20-minute stroll every day, whether by walking to school, getting out at lunchtime or going for a stroll in the evening.
Stay hydrated by drinking water on the move
When exercising it is important to keep hydrated by regularly drinking water. It is recommended that people consume 1.2 litres of water every day to stay healthy, but when we exercise that need can increase.
Be prepared and stay fresh on your walk by filling up a bottle of drinking water at home before you set out - however long you are planning to go for. If it is a hot day even just a short stroll down the street could leave you feeling thirsty - the first sign of dehydration.
Drinking water as you walk will also help to keep your energy levels topped up as dehydration can leave you feeling sluggish, which won't encourage you to get out walking again. The idea of National Walking Month is not only to increase fitness but also to cut pollution, so working hand-in-hand with that ethos ditch the plastic bottles and turn to the water tap.
Fill up at home to help the environment
Filling up a water bottle at home and reusing it will help to fight the mounting pile of plastic bottles that have become a major environmental concern. Maximise the health benefits of drinking water by using filtered water.
National Walking Month also wants to map out how "walkable" the nation's streets are using feedback from those taking part.
Cutting pollution, increasing wellbeing, making the country a better place to walk and reducing the Earth's pile of plastic waste by choosing drinking water from the tap can all play a part in making the world a better place to live.
The great thing about walking is that, as well as being a brilliant low impact form of exercise, it is free. So fill up a bottle of filtered drinking water from the tap at home and head outside to enjoy a healthy lifestyle at no added cost!
