Taking Yoga on a Hike

Chang W. Lee/The New York Times

HYBRID Eugeniya May, left, during a yoga-infused hike in Prospect Park in Brooklyn.

AT first glance, the concept of “hiking yoga” seems like an odd entry in the growing list of hybrid yoga classes, which mix downward dog and tree pose with everything from kickboxing to Pilates and ballet.

A hike usually means going up and down hills; yoga works best on a flat surface. Hikes require sturdy shoes, not bare feet. On a hike, you swat away bugs, not just the buzzing thoughts yoga teachers suggest you clear from your mind.

So when I signed up for a Hiking Yoga class in Prospect Park in Brooklyn in early June, I wasn’t sure what to expect. This yoga fusion option started in San Francisco three years ago and made its debut in New York City this spring, promising the chance to connect with nature in an urban environment, with stops for yoga along the way.

Hiking Yoga offers weekend classes in Prospect Park and Central Park; each 90-minute class costs $20 (less with a package), and you sign up and pay in advance online. If the class gets rained out, or your plans change and you cancel at least 24 hours in advance, you get a credit for use at a later date. (They will probably take a break from around Thanksgiving until March.)

The weather was perfect the day of my outing — cloudy and about 70 degrees — and seven other students showed up at the designated meeting point near Grand Army Plaza in Brooklyn. Joanne Kelly, a yoga teacher who recently moved to New York and usually leads the 10 a.m. Saturday class in Prospect Park, said that she would set a brisk pace between four stops for roughly 10-minute yoga sessions.

Then we set off along a path to our first destination: the Vale of Cashmere, where we formed a circle in what looked like an abandoned fountain. One of the goals of Hiking Yoga is to explore parts of local parks that even longtime city dwellers may have overlooked, and this little enclave in the northern section of Prospect Park was new to me.

“People kind of have their favorite spots — they don’t systematically explore the park,” Eric Kipp, the founder of Hiking Yoga, said in a phone interview. “I want people to raise their curiosity about their own backyard.”

Nonetheless, our group seemed to have raised the curiosity of a few onlookers, and as we stood there with our eyes closed, breathing deeply, I couldn’t help worrying about the safety of our bags, scattered around the perimeter of our circle.

We weren’t using mats yet, so Ms. Kelly led us through mostly standing and balancing poses. On the plus side, we were in a secluded spot with birds chirping and a light breeze. But trying to pull off some yoga poses in sneakers threw me off balance; my triangle pose felt more like a wobbly trapezoid.

Another challenge, for Ms. Kelly at least, was getting stragglers to pick up the pace as we continued our hike, which was really more of a fast walk on mostly flat terrain. Mr. Kipp said that many people signed up with friends, and that Hiking Yoga was meant to be more social than a studio class, but all that talking meant we were often not really hustling along the trails. Ms. Kelly told me on the phone afterward that she tried to adapt to the energy level of the group, as well as to everything else going on in the park.

Our second stop was on a hill overlooking a crowded field of picnickers, dogwalkers and ballplayers; I mentioned to Ms. Kelly later that I found that location too busy and distracting.

“For 80 percent of the hike we take you to out-of-the-way spots,” she pointed out. “But the moments when there’s a dog barking or someone hitting a baseball, that’s a great opportunity to integrate focus into your practice.”

I started to feel a bit like Goldilocks as I evaluated the places we stopped to do yoga — too much of a slope, too many tree roots, too much tall grass in need of a mower — but at the same time, I enjoyed the change of scenery and the chance to practice yoga in the open air.

Ms. Kelly had brought along a backpack full of cut-up pieces of yoga mat, so at our third destination (in the grassy Nethermead) we did sun salutations with these little mats under our hands. We also did some partner exercises, which was a way to mingle a bit — and try balancing poses without the benefit of a wall.

My favorite spot was our last stop, on the peninsula jutting into the lake. Yes, we still had to brush sticks and stones out of the way before laying down our little mats. The ground was uneven, and birds interrupted the silence as we closed our eyes and did more stretching and a little meditation. But the setting was peaceful, the tree branches rustled overhead, and I could feel myself relaxing.

To close the class, Ms. Kelly talked about “balancing against the challenges of the natural world,” and I realized that was a refreshing change — both from the annoyances of a yoga studio (too many people too close together) and from the man-made hassles of daily life (too many digital distractions).

Escaping those familiar routines was sort of the point, and trying to keep my balance with the ground at an angle was a reminder that those little challenges never really go away.