Smart walking to find a balance between yourself and nature

In times of change, between digital transition and awareness how precious and unique our planet is, finding time for yourself, enjoying the beauties that surround us, can be almost imperative. Some call it balance between work and personal life, another survival; a historical and recurring theme among those who claim a return to existence à la Emile Rousseau and those who lose their bearings without a business plan.
Davide Fiz offers intelligent walking, a dimension that allows us to turn our daily routine into an opportunity to explore Italy, a country rich in history, culture and breathtaking landscapes; enjoying a more balanced and rewarding life.

Davide, how and when was your project born?

I’ve been working remotely for over ten years, walking even longer. I do a little less mountain climbing, but enough to know that I enjoy it more than just “I walk when I have time.”

I want to slow down, meet, watch, and I want to be able to do it every day, not just if life gets stuck.

There are many difficult moments in the life of each of us; everyone had to find a new way to get our lives backto reactivate depleted or lost energy. For me, this path came on foot: to reactivate the desire to live, learn, communicate, reconcile with the world.

Smart walking was born at the epicenter of the storm.

In May 2021, the five-year relationship ended, and after 48 hours, with my life and I in several boxes, we left Sicily to return to Livorno. Suddenly my life decided to take off and I thought I would go too.
I packed the boxes in my backpack and set out along the Primordial Route, which leads from Oviedo to Santiago de Compostela.

“It’s hard to become an adult if you’re not traveling alone. It is a way of overcoming fear of the other, as well as of oneself, in which a person finds himself face to face with nostalgia, comes to a new discovery of his roots. Until you travel alone, you will not learn how to communicate with others.

Paul Rumiz

It wasn’t my first walk, not even my second, but walking while your life goes on is not like a weekend hike: it’s something that deeply cleanses and reconciles. I fell into the rhythm of a step, into a chance meeting, into a slowly flowing landscape, gaining time for contemplation.

I became familiar again with the transitions of the season, with rain and wind, with the weight of a backpack on my back, while I think about what I could refuse. And when I went to Santiago, like a mantra, I repeated the payback of the project.Smart walking for smart work“.

At home I still had that slowness in my legs, that sweet movement towards a goal in itself.

“… it doesn’t matter where, the main thing is to go”

Daniele Bersani – Have a nice trip

“Smart walking, 20 regions, 20 paths. Work on the way to Italy to be discovered”, was born in my head and in March 2022 I left for real. Smart Walking took me, backpack and computer along the paths of all regions of Italy, one path for each. In the morning on the pass, in the afternoon on the PC. The work week is a week of walking: when your feet stop, they make room for work.

Are we talking about an environmental or social sustainability project?

I like to think that the project was born to do good to both people and the environment.
When traveling, time is related to the vehicle you move in: since I discovered the paths, it is my legs or my bike that allow me to explore the territory and meet interesting people in life. We must slowly reach the goal in order to have great satisfaction.

“When you go to Ithaca, you must wish that the road was long, fertile for adventures and experiences.”

Ithaca by Konstantinos Cavafy

Walker’s eyes pay attention to details, e returning wanderers are a way to explore yourself. On the other hand, a walk is a way to discover new realities or look at what is already familiar with different eyes.

“The true journey of discovery is not to seek new lands, but to have new eyes.Marcel Proust said, encouraging us to observe the reality around us from an ever-changing perspective.

Smart Walking is also a sustainable tourism project.

A typical day of Smart Walking is walking for 4-5 hours, covering a distance of 12 to 20 km (depending on the difficulty of the route) on paths or roads with little traffic: walking stages. Step with very low environmental impact.

Smart walking is based on chance encounters with locals and therefore does not require any infrastructure or maintenance. The beauty of this type of travel is actually to become temporary inhabitants of the stages that greet you from time to time. Without changing anything.

Would you like to tell us about your latest mission to Val Taleggio?

July was a pretty busy month. I left Bologna on the Wool and Silk Roads. In Prato I intercepted the route from San Jacopo to Livorno. Here I boarded a sailboat that took me to the island of Elba. On the island, I walked along Via del Essenza, a project sought by the Aqua del Elba Foundation, which expands part of the path network that insists on the national park of the Tuscan archipelago.
This is an extraordinary green-blue path: the sea and the mountains. Intoxicated with the aroma of its essences: lavender, rosemary, juniper, broom, cistus, strawberry, immortelle, myrtle, mastic.
Not too long stages make it an ideal route for those who, like me, want to split their day between walking and work.

I was then contacted by Adele Arrigoni Ravasio of Casa Arrigoni, which is part of the Sant Antonio Agricultural Cooperative. The company currently collects milk from 5 farms in Val Taleggio that produce the famous cheese. Strachitunt is the only cheese in the world, and DOP cheese is only made in Val Taleggio. In recent years, young people have also returned to continue the dairy tradition. Who made important investments so as not to lose the heritage of their ancestors who lived and passed cheese from generation to generation.

From 24 to 28 July I was a guest and had the opportunity to visit and get to know some of the realities of local production, people and ways connected with the world of dairy production. On this occasion, an in-depth conference was organized on the topics of slow tourism and work-life balance. Opportunity for various local villages that are trying to rebuild the future, starting with 800 inhabitants.

In these valleys, every inhabitant has a value that we cannot imagine in a big city. Even the absence of some services is a great opportunity to rediscover the value of simplicity. Traveling only with a backpack on my shoulder, today I know well what it means to lighten up, and how much wealth there is in depriving the superfluous.
The territory of Val Taleggio is actively moving towards conscious tourism.tourism, which is not only consumption and entertainment, but also an opportunity for knowledge sharing and exchange.
Basing your projects also on the growing goal of digital nomads, of whom there are around 600,000 in Italy today, also means taking a fresh look at accommodation and hospitality structures suitable for those who prefer to combine working life and a passion for nature, sports, local food and experience with small communities.

What is the mission of Smart Walking?

Smart walking is a personal search for work-life balance or self-discovery. Or the search for a new balance between man and nature. Or search – no matter what you find.
What I like most is to talk about the existence of another Italy that is out of reach of the mainstream. An Italy that is actually made up of many Italys, cultures, traditions, landscapes, food and wine. Kaleidoscope to tell or at least try.
In March 2023, a new project was launched: “Smart walking from coast to coast: paths that cross – paths that unite” …