Fresno Bee’s outdoors writer profiles a hiker who lost 70 pounds.

Each time we met, I learned more about her. How Ordway grew up in rural Tennessee. How she moved to Fresno and ballooned in weight. How she lost nearly 70 pounds and keeps it off by hiking — serious hiking.


How serious? It isn’t even June, and Ordway already has stood above Yosemite Falls four times. Saturday, she and a group hiked 14 miles from Yosemite Valley to Glacier Point and back via the Panorama Trail. She’s also been to Half Dome, Chilnualna Fall (three times), Angel Falls and Lewis Creek.


For anyone, let alone a 57-year-old grandmother, that’s quite a list.

As much as I’m loath to post links that encourage the weight-reduction racket (hence my relative poverty), I have to make the “it worked for me” exception for hiking-related stories. I often tell people “yeah, I hiked off almost 40 pounds,” which is true to an extent, but actually, most of my working-it-off happened on hilly country roads where I walked as fast I could push myself six days a week while dodging commuters and crotch rocketeers, and swapping Cokes and cookies for bottled water and baby carrots. Suffering, in other words.

I feel like hiking is payback for all the weight-loss drudgery. And the more I hike, the less drudgery I have to go through. Speaking of which, it’s time for my morning walk.