The following is a Day 1 update by Greg Yost, who’s on the trail of the Walk for Our Grandchildren, July 19th-July 27th.
Heat! Blisters! Sweat and sore muscles!
Exhaustion? Yeah, there was some of that, too…Man, what a fantastic first day we had.
The 2013 Walk For Our Grandchildren got off to a roaring start today from Camp David and tonight is 11 miles closer to its White House goal.
We’re walking 100 miles to carry a message from every dried up, burned, flooded, hurricaned, and sick-and-tired-of-climate-inaction corner of this country to President Obama. We demand substantive leadership climate NOW starting with a final and unequivocal rejection of the Keystone XL pipeline.
Basically, President Obama, no more ifs, ands, or buts. Climate change is the most pressing issue this nation has ever faced. Lead or get out of the way.
And who is delivering this feisty message? WE ARE! Today we were 22 strong with critical back up from our support team keeping us supplied with snacks and cool water. We’ll be in Harpers Ferry, WV on Sunday where our numbers will grow to 75 or more. As we move closer to DC, numbers will swell yet again with hundreds joining each day as day walkers.
Interested? Go to http://joinsummerheat.org/maryland and sign up to get more information on where and when to meet us. Also, check out http://joinsummerheat.org/dc for the latest on two actions we’re initiating in DC on Friday, July 26th and Saturday, July 27th. Get to DC if you can and get active. This is a great way to do it.

Here’s a brief rundown of today’s Walk:
We began just before noon at a park in Thurmont, MD. After so many weeks of frenzied organizing, it was a poignant moment to finally put faces to the names and to hear each person speak aloud their reason for participating.
We then rode over to the entrance of Camp David for the start of the Walk proper. We discovered there’s a reason presidents hang out there. It’s beautiful!

Park police showed up and firmly but politely informed us that we were in violation of their rules against unpermitted processions with more than 25 people and they threatened to issue us a citation. We pled our innocence–was it our fault these NPR reporters and other press members showed up and decided to walk with us? Crisis averted. It helped matters that while Jim Brown and Steve Norris smoothed things over with the police, the rest of us kept walking out of the park just as fast as we could!

The rest of our route took us over some beautiful back country Maryland roads. We stopped to engage the curious every chance we had and received a warm reception everywhere we went. We’re spending the night tonight camped in the yard of some very gracious hosts (thanks, Tammy and Helen!). Tomorrow it’s on to Myersville, MD where we’ll lend our support to a courageous group of people fighting a dirty and dangerous gas compressor station.

So that’s our report tonight from the end of a long, exhausting, and rewarding day. We’re rolling! We’ve got a good team doing serious work and having way too much fun together. Building community and growing a movement is definitely its own reward.
More soon!
-Greg Yost for the 2013 Walk For Our Grandchildren
Follow walkers @_Grandchildren and #Walk4Grandkids on Twitter and on here on Facebook.