EverWalk provided her with a training schedule, and Petersen recalls her first long-distance warm-up walk of 18 miles.

“The blisters kicked in at about Mile 16,” she says.

By the time the actual event took place, she had learned to better care for her feet.

Other EverWalk participants weren’t as prepared, but Nyad and Stoll had an EMT delivering first aid as well as a second EMT who biked back and forth along the route to keep an eye on walkers and point the way for the directionally challenged. There was also a bus for those who needed a break.

Petersen used each rest stop — about every five miles — to rehydrate and refuel. At night, she slept in local hotels where her luggage had been delivered. (EverWalk, which charged a registration fee of $395, arranged discounts on hotels and provided lunch, snacks and transportation.)

Petersen made it the entire distance.

“I learned that just because you think of yourself as a type of person, like nonathletic, doesn’t mean you have to live your whole life that way,” she says.

National movement

That’s exactly what Nyad and Stoll are hoping for: a nation of people willing to push away from their chairs and take to the sidewalks and park trails.

“Most people will never swim from Cuba to Florida or run the New York City Marathon,” Nyad says. “You have to work so hard and be so focused. But people can imagine walking from Chicago to St. Louis or Portland to Seattle.”

The vision of an endurance event for the everyday American caught the attention of Chris Devona, 57, of Mount Prospect, Illinois.

Devona joined EverWalk’s first challenge despite his Stage 4 thyroid cancer. He walked with a brace because of knee replacement surgery, averaging about three miles every hour. Crossing the “achieve line” in San Diego was ultra-satisfying.

“To complete the whole route makes the average guy feel like he just won the Olympics,” Devona says.

It may seem strange that a function as basic as walking can trigger an overwhelming feeling of accomplishment. After all, humans are built to walk long distances. But we just don’t do it anymore.

According to the documentary “The Walking Revolution,” Americans stopped walking in the 1950s and 1960s when families began moving to the suburbs and the automobile became the favored mode of transportation. Add the television set. Computers. Social media. Alexa. Now we have a nation of sitters. What was once a normal part of daily living has become an effort Americans need to schedule.

Crossing America

By 2020, Nyad and Stoll intend to travel by foot across America.

Initially, their plan was to walk coast-to-coast with a million people, sort of like Forrest Gump. But after driving cross-country in an RV, they realized the trek works for one or two people but wouldn’t work well for the masses. The long stretches of remote areas were “not conducive to lots of folks coming out to meet up with us,” Nyad says.

So in recent months, Nyad and Stoll’s vision has changed. They continue to hold on to their dream of walking across America in some way — maybe by visiting all 50 states.

For now, EverWalk is dedicated to supporting anyone who walks — whether strolling around the neighborhood after dinner, running errands on foot or taking out the dog.

“I don’t care if you’re walking with Avon or on the John Muir trail,” Stoll says, referring to breast cancer walks sponsored by the cosmetics company and the California hiking route. “Just start with the pledge to walk three times a week. You don’t have to be an athlete. It’s free and it’s for everyone. If you’re in a chair, pledge to do the roll.”

For some, walking has less to do with the physical and mental challenges and more to do with the spiritual element.

Linda Fitts, 66, has walked the Camino del Santiago, a pilgrimage route in Spain, three times. As a physician who worked in internal medicine and hospice care, she was prompted to walk, in part, to recover from career burnout.

“I reached a point where I needed rest and reflection,” she says.

Fitts, who lives in Southern California, also participated as an epic walker in the trek from Los Angeles to San Diego.

For her, moving along a walking path has a calming effect.

“I like to use the image of not only am I walking the road ahead of me, the road is walking through me. When I begin to feel that flow, it’s a very cleansing and moving process for me,” Fitts says.

The word “walk” means “way of life.” And for many, it really is.

“I never regret having gone for a walk,” Petersen says. “I can say to myself, ‘I don’t feel like it,’ and drag myself out, and I’ll never not feel a little bit better than when I left the house.”

On the EverWalk website is a map of future events, including two proposed that include Illinois: one from Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, to Chicago; and another from Springfield, Illinois, to St. Louis, Missouri. See the website for more information about these proposed Epic Walks.