Following recent weeks of subzero weather in Wisconsin, Milwaukeeans enjoyed a break from the frostbite-inducing cold the weekend of Jan. 31. Twenty-degree temperatures brought the city outside again, and even led Girls Who Walk Milwaukee to Lakeshore State Park for a two-mile walk.
The Henry Maier Festival Park grounds grace the west side of the park, across a section of the lake currently scattered with ice fishers. Though dormant in the winter months, the summer season is full of festivals, including Summerfest. To the east, Lake Michigan waves crashed over breakwater walls, rippling the ice in the Milwaukee Bay.
The Saturday walk by the lakefront was also redemptive, making up for a cancellation the week prior due to extreme cold.
“Ideally, we usually try to have a couple of walks a month,” Zoe Shanaver, a 24-year-old Milwaukee local who joined the Girls Who Walk team in December 2024, said.
Girls Who Walk Milwaukee is a local group that creates an avenue for connection and movement, led by women, but open to anyone who wants to join. Events are posted on the organization’s Instagram page and calendar at the beginning of each month.
Routes span the Milwaukee area and bordering suburbs, with most taking place on various trails around the city. Walks are suitable for all paces, and the group welcomes those with strollers and mobility devices, as well as dogs on leashes.
Sam Schulte, the group’s founder, created the Instagram page in 2023 and got it started on a train back to Milwaukee from Chicago, Shanaver said.
The group took a brief break during the latter half of October and the months of November and December, as both Shanaver and Schulte have full-time jobs, but the new year brought new opportunities for walks.
Saturday’s walk began at the Milwaukee Pierhead Lighthouse, while the first walk of the year started at Moosa’s Custard Stand and circled Lake Park. About 25 women of all ages braved the snow to attend the event, which looped around a section of the Hank Aaron State Trail that sits in Lakeshore State Park.
Shanaver was the lead on Jan. 31, responsible for guiding the group through the selected route. She’s participated in 20 to 30 walks total and has led around 15 since joining the team. The total number of outings has added up to over 100 since the group started in May 2023.
“We’re probably coming in around 150 [now],” Shanaver said.
Several first-timers showed up, mixed in with repeat walkers from around the area. Jokes about shorts weather and impending “warm” thirty-degree temperatures could be heard as the group set off.
Katie Woletz, a 23-year-old financial analyst from Milwaukee, said that she was inspired to join Saturday’s walk because a friend texted her a picture while she was out on her own.
“I haven’t been outside in two weeks because of the cold, so I decided to go on a walk today,” Woletz said.
It was Woletz’s second walk with the group, her first taking place in Bayview over the summer. She said she’s moving out of the city in a couple of months and is using the walks as an opportunity to make the most of the time she has left in Milwaukee.
The group was initially inspired by Chicago’s chapter, which operates similarly to Milwaukee’s, with a goal to get walkers out exploring the city. That’s exactly what the group is accomplishing.
“I’ve come to a couple of these because I want to get out more in terms of exercise and meeting people.” Malin Morris, a computer science student at the Milwaukee School of Engineering, said. “This seems like a good medium for that.”
Morris has accompanied the group since the summer, joining walks that are local and easy for her to get to.
Girls Who Walk also organizes social and wellness events through community collaborations, like Full Moon Beach Yoga with Tribal Yoga School at Atwater Beach in Shorewood and the Susan G. Komen MORE THAN PINK Walk, where Girls Who Walk created their own walking team to participate.
In October, Girls Who Walk collaborated with The Well Red Damsel, an independent romance bookstore in Wauwatosa, for an audiobook walk. Shanaver’s favorite outing was in collaboration with Downtown Milwaukee, where ambassadors from City Tours led them on an art tour, viewing different sculptures around the city.
“From her first to most recent walk, she’s yet to have no one show up,” Shanaver said about Schulte’s experience as the founder. “We’ve walked through a blizzard before, and Sam had ten people come.”
For those who can’t make it to Girls Who Walk Milwaukee events, Marquette University has its own walking club, which aims to allow students to explore the city while reducing stress and connecting with new people.
This story was written by Lilly Peacock. She can be reached at [email protected].
