6 weeks (had to wait to drive) after replacement I drove to Az and hiked the Chiricahua mountains. No trouble with getting into fiver. For those thinking about knee replacement. DO YOUR EXERCISES. follow dr's orders do your therapy and suffer threw the pain. It won't kill you, although it feels like it. Two friends would rather use pain killers than not and ended up hooked and one still isn't walking right and the other one got so consipated from pain killers it shut down his guts, had to have surgery to remove some intestines, never left hospital alive. And he was in pretty good health before knee surgery.