At first, local man and walking icon Karl Malchow of Sonoma was a skipper. Not the kind of skipper you read about in accounts of World War II naval battles. Karl was a skipper of a different type. As soon as Karl got his reliable footing beneath him, he began to skip for joy. He would skip up and down Lomita Avenue in front of his childhood home for the most simple and least spectacular of reasons.
As a witness to young Karl’s spontaneous skipping episodes, I often wondered from where the boundless and effortless energy came. Almost four decades later I am still in awe over Karl’s ability to move on foot alone with an unmatched determination and rate. In the early 1970’s Karl’s family relocated to North Castle Road and the stage was set for the next three and three quarter decades of pedestrian heroics.
At age 13 Karl began his continuous and ever-present odyssey. He started with the occasional walk to Sonoma Valley High School and around town with friends and the family dog, “SOB.” The big black hound earned his moniker by refusing to be house broken – the name became a natural result. Karl graduated from SVHS in 1977 and subsequently worked for two local businesses doing auto and truck repair for a few years. He drove his trusty, red Volkswagen Karman Ghia to work each day. The year was 1985 and Karl Malchow was about to become a pioneer in the Green Movement before it even existed.
He took a job at London House in Sonoma as a maintenance man and began walking to work and back from his home on North Castle Road. He continued this daily 4.8 mile round-trip consistently for 20 years, supplementing it with twice daily jaunts on weekends to some of his favorite fast food haunts, including 7-11, McDonalds and Taco Bell. Karl eventually left London House for his current job at Sonoma Market, and, as you might have guessed, walks to and from work each day.
Here are some facts that set Karl apart from most everyone that lives in our little Valley of the Moon. In the last 24 years, Karl has walked a little more than 48,000 miles to and from work. He has not purchased immeasurable amounts of fuel and not spent untold hours behind the wheel clogging our already congested local streets. Karl was reducing the carbon footprint before most of us knew what it was.
Karl’s 48,000 miles on foot here in Sonoma is a living and moving monument to conservation. As it is measured, our blue planet is approximately 24,000 miles in circumference and Karl has covered this distance more than two times already and is now working on another 24,000 miles. When you see Karl about town making his way with his purposeful and steady stride, just be aware that you are witnessing a true conservation pioneer in action and a man walking his way around the world – again.
