Peter Jackson column

Sep 8 2005 By Peter Jackson, The Journal

I owe the Ministry of Silly Walks an apology. Some time ago I wrote about those people, who, when going hiking, arm themselves with not one, but two walking sticks.

And I meant the kind of walking sticks that look like ski poles and which the hikers stab into the ground before them as if on some grim Alpine mission.

I wrote: "Could it be that they have discovered something about the simple act of walking that has been unsuspected by mankind for the past few millennia? I think not."

Well, I've had to think again.

I read this week that what I have been observing with such amused interest is, in fact, called Nordic walking, and it is a serious business.

It originated apparently in Finland as a less strenuous spin-off to skiing (less strenuous and far less fun one would have thought), and is spreading across the globe, supported by the medical profession as a more complete form of exercise than normal walking. Not only does it take more effort than normal walking, it also exercises the upper body and it is claimed to be particularly suitable for the elderly or injured.

Classes are springing up across the country and in Staffordshire a designated `Nordic walking park' has been proposed.

It just goes to show that the craziest sounding idea could be a winner and that something which might tomorrow be an indispensable part of life is mocked today by short-sighted fools such as myself.

And this is a lesson which constantly has to be relearned by businessmen and investors.

Take the bicycle, which was regarded at best as a toy when it was first invented but which, in a Radio 4 survey in May was voted by far and away the nation's favourite invention.

It is encouraging that the nation's inventors are still churning out the ideas.

Only this summer a Leicestershire man invented a 99p coin - called the cornet - to solve the problem of accumulating all those pennies in change.

Or take the Brunel University student, who, this week, revealed the idea of a clothes peg, which can forecast rain within the next half-hour and will then lock itself to prevent washing being hung on the line.

Just keep `em coming.