The Path is an antigravity metal walkway that prevents the hunters, who are engaged in a time-traveling safari to the Cretaceous period, from interacting with the environment in unintentionally destructive ways, such as by stepping on an organism. Because they don't know exactly what effects their actions will have on the future, they want to minimize their influence on the past outside of the animals they intend to hunt.
It is extremely important that the hunters stay on the Path, because this is both a means of minimizing unintentional contact and alteration with the past, and also because it functions as a very clear metaphor for the story; by staying on the Path, one is doing things "right", and straying from the Path implies deviation, chaos and destruction.
As is evidenced at the end of the story, Eckers strayed from the path, crushing a butterfly, and altering the course of history such that English is written differently and a different president is elected when he returns to his own time.
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