If you haven’t listened to Apple’s Time To Walk series yet, this is the episode to start with

With half the country in lockdown and the other half feeling like they’re probably only a case or two away from potentially being locked down, exercise has become a crucial part of our day and our wellbeing. So we’re all walking.

Some of us are walking in our singles bubbles, some of us are walking with one other person not from our household for some much-needed human interaction, and some of us are even walking with cocktails in KeepCups pretending it’s just a coffee.

But for those walking solo, most of us are doing it with our AirPods and earphones firmly in our ears, listening to a podcast, playlist or perhaps even this awesome feature on Apple Fitness+.

In January this year, Apple Fitness launched their ‘Time to Walk‘ feature for Apple Watch and Fitness+ users, billed as an “an inspiring audio walking experience” created to encourage users to walk more often and reap the benefits of getting their step count up.

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Each original Time to Walk episode invites users to immerse themselves in a walk alongside influential and interesting people as they share thoughtful and meaningful stories, photos, and music.

Since then they’ve featured episodes with country music star Dolly Parton, pop stars Shawn Mendes, Kesha and Nick Jonas, acting legend Jane Fonda and Emmy Award winner Uzo Aduba.

But now, Time to Walk has finally featured its first ever Aussie, none other than Australian Paralympic legend and wheelchair athlete, Kurt Fearnley, (who has competed in five consecutive Paralympic Games, winning three gold medals and won over 40 marathons, including New York, Chicago and London, no less.)

For anyone in a wheelchair, like Kurt, Time to Walk automatically changes to Time to Push. How cool is that?

So if you’ve ever wanted try out the Time To Walk series, this is the episode to do it.

“I’m pushing on an old rail line they’ve been able to turn into a bike path and a walking track,” Fearnley begins. “It’s pretty much right in the centre of the town that I live, of Newcastle, Australia, but you hop on to this thing, and you follow it for 15 kilometers. And you get to experience everything from the beach to what feels like a rainforest. And you’re surrounded by these beautiful, big trees from jacarandas to figs to beautiful gum trees.”

From there, he describes everything from how his “parents had never seen disability before” to how his arms are “my heel, my hip. They are… They are the thing that just gives me life”.

He tells stories of how the tiny country town he grew up in started raising money to buy him a racing wheelchair as a kid, how he ripped the steering off his chair during a race to mark his fifth straight win in the New York Marathon and even what it was like to crawl the Kokoda Trail through the jungles of Papua New Guinea.

“It would be 11 days that I would crawl along the track,” he says. “Every day was about nine hours of crawling. Every single time you would move your body a meter, it was like a benchpress. And the physicality was hard, but there’s also leeches, and you’re constantly wet, and you’re constantly sinking into mud.”

It’s an incredibly moving and motivating story and one that will have you so immersed you’ll reach your daily step target without even realising.

So if you’re looking for some company on your next walk, why not ask Kurt to join you? Because right now, we’ve all got Time to Walk.

Time to Walk episodes are automatically downloaded to Apple Watch with a Fitness+ subscription which costs $14.99 per month, or $119.99 per year.