Peaks of Interest: Hiking Adventures with Hirak Parikh

When

Thursday March 17, 2016: 7:00pm to 8:30pm  Add to Calendar /   Add to Google Calendar

Where

Downtown Library: Multi-Purpose Room

Description

Hirak Parikh moved to Stuttgart, Germany in 2013 and spent about a year in Europe hiking some of the world’s tallest and most scenic mountains, including the Swabian Alps, the Swiss-Austrian Alps, and the Balkans. He founded the Stuttgart Hiking Meetup to explore the lesser known local Swabian Alps and the more famous Alps that are further to the south. The highlight of his time there was walking across the Peaks of the Balkans. This challenging trail loops around Kosovo, Montenegro and Albania and takes about 10-13 days to traverse the 120 miles. Hirak's writeup was featured in the January 2016 issue of Backpacker magazine and the hike was ranked at #2 out of 32 places on the Life List.

Hirak will share his experiences hiking, photos of his adventures, and tips for hikers interested in making their own journeys.

Hirak Parikh was born and raised in Pune, a region in Western India at the foothills of the Sahayadri mountains. He moved to Ann Arbor for grad school in 2002 and never really left. An avid amateur hiker, Hirak has hiked along the Inca Trail in Peru and climbed Mt. Whitney. He is a proud father of 2 little girls and a rambunctious coonhound. While not hiking or running, he's reading the many books checked out of the AADL.