In most of the popular hiking spots in my state, once you go a mile down a trail there's like nobody around.
IMO it's more about duration than mileage. You can't call it a hike if it's under an hour, that's a walk. I'm of the opinion that if you can do it comfortably without drinking water it's probably a walk. That said, three miles can definitely be a hike, there are plenty of trails in the northeast US that will give you >2000 feet of elevation gain in that distance.
Much like the BMI is useless if you're a bodybuilder statistic I'm fairly certain the average hike in the US or anywhere is not made up of a significant enough amount of hiking straight up a vertical wall to make this statistic entirely worthless
In most of the popular hiking spots in my state, once you go a mile down a trail there's like nobody around.
IMO it's more about duration than mileage. You can't call it a hike if it's under an hour, that's a walk. I'm of the opinion that if you can do it comfortably without drinking water it's probably a walk. That said, three miles can definitely be a hike, there are plenty of trails in the northeast US that will give you >2000 feet of elevation gain in that distance.
Much like the BMI is useless if you're a bodybuilder statistic I'm fairly certain the average hike in the US or anywhere is not made up of a significant enough amount of hiking straight up a vertical wall to make this statistic entirely worthless