Published Tuesday, May 06, 2008 9:02 AM
Updated Tuesday, May 06, 2008 9:03 AM

 

An American Journey

Walk of faith leads Californian through Moncks Corner


If you did any traveling on Highway 17-A last week, you may be wondering about the woman carrying an American flag in one hand and waving at you with the other.

Relax … she wasn’t a great aunt twice removed that you forgot about or even a former co-worker from the distant past.

She was Lyn Hanush, a 66-year-old Californian who is walking, waving and praying her way up the Eastern United States.

Hanush’s journey from Ormond Beach, Fla. to Madawaska, Maine took her through Summerville and Moncks Corner last week. She tries to walk 15 to 20 miles each day. By the time she is done, which she believes will be in October, she would have walked more than 1,600 miles.

“The purpose of the trip is to pray specifically for the election year,” Hanush said during an interview at the corner of 17-A and Main Street in Moncks Corner. “This is a critical election year, so I’m praying for the voters of America to have wisdom when they vote.

“We don’t need to just ask who is the lesser of two evils. We need to really research the candidates and vote with wisdom.”

She says she is also praying for our current leaders, from mayors to legislators to the President.

“Right down the line, I pray for them all,” she said. “And like before, I am praying for every community I walk through and everybody I wave to.”

Prior to this journey, she walked from one end of the U.S. West Coast to the other and from May 2003 to July 2004 she participated in the Great American Journey, during which she walked 4,026.5 miles diagonally across the U.S. That trip began in Blaine, Wash. and ended in Key West, Fla.

“I think God planted the seed in my heart,” she said. “It all started out as a dream of mine when I was 11 years old. I wanted to bicycle across America. Around 1980, I took up walking and decided that might be a good way to go.”

Hanush was planning a trip across America when the terrorist attacks of 2001 changed the world. That historic day inspired her to move forward with her plans and to shift the focus to praying.

“It was my husband’s suggestion,” she said. “I had prayed on other walks, but after 911 we felt our nation really needed our prayers. It motivated me to make it a real walk of prayer. I also encourage others to pray.

“God has called on me to pray as I walk step by step, but I think he calls on all of us to pray, no matter where we are. I’m hoping everyone will pray for our nation this year.”

Hanush’s friend, Daryl Fahey, is serving as her driver this trip, picking her up at the end of each day’s walk and returning her to the spot where she left off the following day. When Fahey is unavailable, the walker relies on volunteer drivers to help keep her on schedule. During her trip through the Lowcountry, radio station WKCL arranged for some of her transportation.

”Everyone has been wonderful to me since I’ve been in the area,” Hanush said. “The people at the radio station have been an incredible help. I don’t think I had ever been to South Carolina before this trip and I can’t get over how beautiful it is.

“I enjoyed walking through the swamplands where the forests are so thick and the birds are singing, and seeing all the flowers in bloom here. Everything is so green and beautiful.”

Her journeys have taken her through places many may never see. She has even walked through areas others avoid.

“I’ve walked through an area where there are known gangs,” she said. “I was a little concerned, but I knew that was where I was supposed to be.

“One of my fondest memories is from walking through the Crow Indian reservation in Montana. We had been told not to go through there because it was a dangerous place with a lot of drugs and alcohol, but we felt God wanted us to walk through there. The people there were wonderful. They actually came out and asked us to pray for them.”

It’s impossible to calculate how many people Hanush has prayed for during her walks. However, she often takes prayer requests from people she stops and talks to on her journeys. She estimates the number of prayer requests she has honored to be in the hundreds.

The mother of four, grandmother of seven and great-grandmother of two (with another on the way) has documented some of her experiences in the book “Putting a Face on America, The Great American Journey.” Hanush says it is a good read for young and old alike.

“It has 42 pages of full color pictures and is available on line,” she said. “It’s about the people I met and my experiences.”

For more information on the book or to read Hanush’s journal entries from her walk through the Lowcountry, visit www.greatamericajourney.com.