This is my first Top 10 list involving music after decades of making mixtapes and playlists.  This month I have been backpacking the Arizona National Scenic Trail, but these songs would be great on any walk.  I have only listened to music on less than 10% of my miles so far, but this was a fun project think about (especially while walking dirt roads which can be tedious and requires less concentration). I included my favorite lyrics from each song and a couple about Alaska in the Honorable Mentions since living there last summer is when I first conceived of attempting this 800-mile trek. Click here for all my Top 10 lists. This link should work to see the playlist on Amazon Music.

10. Beauty In Walking Away by Marié Digby

It’s never quite simple, it’s never that safe

It never seems perfect until it’s too late

It’s never the right time to find a new way

9. Avalanches (Culla’s Song) by A Fine Frenzy

We found ourselves atop of a mountain peak

The air was thin as a beggar’s sleeve

The city lights were miles away

The hush was as thick as your winter coat

8. Above The Timberline by Five For Fighting

Things get slower when it’s harder to breath

I can almost touch the stars that are hanging over me

7. The Climb by Miley Cyrus

Always gonna be an uphill battle

Sometimes I’m gonna have to lose

Ain’t about how fast I get there

Ain’t about what’s waiting on the other side

It’s the climb

6. Walking Slow by Jackson Browne

Don’t know why I’m happy

I’ve got no reason to feel this good

Maybe it’s because I’m all alone and I’ve got no place to go

5. Have You Ever by Brandi Carlile

Have you ever wandered lonely through the woods?

And everything there feels just as it should

You’re part of the life there

You’re part of something good

4. Walk Hard by John C. Reilly

Seen my share of the worse that this world can give

But I still got a dream and a burning rage to live

Walk hard

3. Ends Of The Earth by Lord Huron

No time for ponderin’ why I’m-a wanderin’

Not while we’re both still alive

To the ends of the earth, would you follow me?

There’s a world that was meant for our eyes to see

2. Boulevard Of Broken Dreams by Green Day

I walk a lonely road, the only one that I have ever known

Don’t know where it goes but it’s home to me and I walk alone

…and finally my #1 backpacking song:

1. Keep On Walking by Jem

If it’s true that love makes the world go round, please give some love to me

‘Cause I’m feeling so alone right now, it’s suffocating me

God give me strength to keep on walking

.

Honorable Mentions              

Arizona Night by Roger Clyne & The Peacemakers

When the mad sun′s, mad day’s tirade is through

Evening comes to seduce you in diamonds on her dress of velvet blue

Something in the Arizona night

Makes us crazy from the heat and dizzy from the height

More Than This by Roxy Music (especially the cover by Missy Higgins)  

As free as the wind

Hopefully learning

Why the sea on the tide

Has no way of turning

More than this

Alaska by Maggie Rogers       

I was walking through icy streams

That took my breath away

Moving slowly through westward water

Over glacial plains

And I walked off you and I walked off an old me

Winter’s Lament by Jamestown Revival

Pinyon pines, horizon lines, the fading of the snow

Darling it’s a pity all this idle time

Let’s set out for the countryside and see what we can find

Where Did You Sleep Last Night by Lead Belly (cover by Nirvana)             

In the pines, in the pines

Where the sun don’t ever shine

I would shiver the whole night through

To The Wild Country by John Denver

Then my heart turns to Alaska

And freedom on the run

I can hear her spirit calling me

To the mountains, I can rest there

To the rivers, I will be strong

To the forests, I’ll find peace there

To the wild country, where I belong

Know someone who loves National Parks? Gift them my travel guidebook A Park to Yourself: Finding Solitude in America’s 63 National Parks.