It’s been said that youth is wasted on you the young. But North Vancouver’s Alistair Booth and Michael Sainas are putting theirs to tremendous use.

The 22-year-old Handsworth Secondary grads just walked more than 126 kilometres from Grouse Mountain to Chilliwack over 26 hours, purely for the hell of it.

Neither can explain exactly why they got the itchy foot apart from the fact that they enjoy each other’s company and have a history of going on long distance walks together.

“There’s no real reason, to be completely honest. We just knew that we could,” Booth said.

“Thoughts pop into our minds and then we just kind of do it without really figuring out if it’s a dumb idea or not,” Sainas added.

The pair had a rough route in mind when they set off in the evening on Aug. 13 to complete three consecutive marathons.They wore high-visibility vests and hardhats to keep themselves safe. But they didn’t put a lot of thought into it beyond that.

“We didn’t know what our fuel plan was. We didn’t know what our break plan was. I think I ChatGPT’d it, like, 30 minutes before we started,” Booth said.

The first marathon was a breeze, but around the 50-km mark, it was becoming physically strenuous. Sainas and Booth were forming some pretty nasty blisters on their feet and their gaits became more of a hobble. It was hard to think about much else, Sainas said. Their plan was to pop some Tylenol and “keep truckin,’” but something unexpected was starting to happen.

What started as an audacious challenge among chums turned into a social media spectacle. It was a last-minute call by Sainas to film short clips of the sojourn every few hours and share them on an Instagram account followed by just eight close friends.

As they racked up steps through the night, they racked up followers online – more than 5,000. As word spread, new fans and helpers tracked them down to deliver protein bars, fast food, Gatorade, painkillers and some local knowledge numerous times over the night and day. Messages of support came streaming in online and drivers who recognized them honked their horns and shouted words of encouragement.

When they got within a few kilometres of their destination – a pub in Chilliwack’s District 1881 – they picked up a small entourage who wanted to finish the walk with them. Booth and Sainas arranged for another friend to meet them, but when they arrived at the finish line, there was a crowd of 20 to 30 strangers waiting for them with beers (which the two promptly chugged out of the shoes they’d just done 170,000 steps in).

“They were excited to meet us. And it’s so funny because before this, it was just going to be you and me going on a walk. No one would have known,” Booth said. “It didn’t make any sense.”

They earned solid bragging rights, but there was a price to be paid by their bodies.

“I’m just aching all over…. My feet look like crap. I looked like someone ran over my feet. All the muscles are sore,” Sainais said.

And the journey has left some other legacies, including about 6,000 Instagram followers waiting to see what they’ll do next.

Booth said they’ll continue to go on adventures together and they don’t mind sharing videos along the way, but they have no plans to become content creators for the sake of being internet famous. You’ll only see them out pursuing the possibly-crazy schemes they’d want to do anyways.

For instance, on Aug. 25 they consumed 10,000 calories of Denny’s food between them and then burned them off doing the Grouse Grind 10 times in a single day.

And no hero’s journey is complete without learning some lessons along the way. In deeply cynical times and a notoriously unfriendly world of social media, Sainais said their interactions with strangers restored some faith in humanity.

“We didn’t realize how many kind people there are out there,” he said.

And Booth said he hopes they inspire others to push themselves to attempt their own daring escapades for no reason other than the pure enjoyment of it.

“I think so many people are quick to dismiss themselves. ‘Oh, no, I can’t do that…’ without actually just trying,” Booth said.

“I think a lot of people probably could do it. They’ve just got to say they can do it,” Sainas added.

If you aren’t scandalized by colourful language, you can follow Booth and Sainas’ Instagram account at instagram.com/offhourstv/.