A couple of weeks ago I stumbled across a programme on the BBC “Take a hike” the concept is nothing new, five total strangers, meet up and over the course of a week, they share a common interest, taking it in turn to plan the events of a day at a time. In secret, they score their opponents out of ten, the winner is revealed at the end of the week, so nothing new there. What attracted me to this particular attempt at this format was that each day, the group of five would share a walk together and be scored, on the views, the terrain, the knowledge of the host and the entertainment value. I have always loved the rich variety of scenery on offer in this corner of the world, from the stunning mountains of Scotland, through the rambling hills, the coastal paths, and beautiful villages and I have always appreciated all, without a great deal of preference.
The first week of walks was in Devon, the second, in Northumberland, and third in the Scottish highlands. Watching brought back some happy memories of holidays I have been on and it was lovely seeing old familiar places and some places I would love to visit in the future. The second series started with five walks in my home county of Yorkshire, which brought back a lot of happy memories, then a week on the Isle of Skye, a place I have never visited, but my appetite was well and truly whetted. I have just started to catch up on week three, which is in North Wales, a place where I worked for a while in my late teenage years selling children’s clothing to small retailers, so working, rather than walking.
What strikes me about this particular programme is that on most weeks, there is a game player, who applies the logic, that if they deliberately mark everybody else low, while the others are being genuine, the maths are stacked in their favour, meaning that when their turn comes, they could potentially win. This sounds like a good strategy and normally, on day one, vindictive as I am, I have spotted that individual and hope that they don’t win. Unfortunately, their strategy is flawed, because they seem to rely too much on the maths, and their walk is often not as good as one of their rivals.
This reminds me that quality will always win against cheating and maybe we are all tempted to take short cuts, find the easy option. Jesus reminds us in Matthew 7: 13 to enter through the narrow gate, for the way that leads to destruction is wide and many travel that road, but the gate to life is narrow and few people find it.