Walking Tours Between Villages
 

Hi, all! A few friends and I would like to take a weeklong scenic walking tour, hiking between villages with the route, accommodations, and luggage transfers provided. We've narrowed potential countries down to the UK, Spain, the Netherlands, and Portugal, with hikes of under 10 miles each day (and not terribly challenging). We're also hoping for a mix of cute villages and varied scenery (e.g., fields, farmland, coastal areas, woods, and/or mountains -- just not the same thing every day). I'm not asking for a perfect solution (!!), but I'd love to know if you've done something similar and hear about any tours you recommend. Thanks!

Lots of walking ways in the UK. https://www.nationaltrail.co.uk/en_GB/ some friends of ours did the Cotswold Way two years ago and enjoyed it but watch out for the weather especially in the UK because some paths get muddy. Most long distance once have the mud removed years ago, but take care. I tend to do short distance ones in Yorkshire and mix with buses.

The same friends also did a Portugeuse Camino last year, being along the coast it meant what could have been too hot was bareable but avoid the high temp months.

abbydog, we have used three companies that organize self-guided multi-day long distance walks. All of these companies will book your accommodations, ensure that your luggage is transferred to your next village, and typically provide guidance on things to see along the way, local dining options, and how to reach the the start of the route and how to get back after the end:

- with Celtic Trails, we walked on Offa's Dyke Path in Wales and the Cotswolds Way in England https://www.celtictrailswalkingholidays.co.uk
- with Mickledore, we walked the Cumbria Way in England https://www.mickledore.co.uk
- with On Foot, we walked in Tuscany, Liguria, and Spain (and we have them booked for Slovenia in May) https://www.onfootholidays.co.uk

These three companies are all based in the UK and are rock solid for responsiveness, integrity, and reliability.

Of the three, I would give the edge to On Foot. Two things stand out: while their office is in Salisbury, they have a local rep on site for each walk. This is is invaluable for last minute information on weather, river levels (if you have to ford), transportation disruptions, etc. These reps are easily contacted and will bail you out of a jam. Secondly, their turn-by-turn walking instructions are the best we have used, and they provide a companion app that that shows your route and your current location using the built-in GPS on your phone. You may miss a turn, but the app has an alarm that will tell you that you are off-piste.

As far as I can recollect, none of these companies offers any walks in the Netherlands. Celtic Trails and Mickledore are weighted to the UK, but On Foot has a range of walks in Spain, Portugal, the UK, and several other European countries.

The one thing that comes to mind is your goal of keeping your walks under 10 miles (roughly 16 kilometres) a day. Many of the walks offered by these three companies have higher daily distances, but On Foot is notable for offering shortening options on some days. The other issue is consideration of ascents and descents. We have yet to walk on any of these that did not involve significant cumulative climb, but each company's route grading will give you an idea of how they grade their walks and what that implies. As a point of reference, my wife and I are in our 70s and have learned that we are happiest with On Foot's "easy" and "easy-medium," although we can handle medium and hard on occasion.

If you click on my name, you will see trip reports for our walks on Offa's Dyke and the Cumbria Way, as well as Tuscany and Liguria. (I'm working on a report on our recent walk in eastern Spain.)

I plan my own cycling tours but I have used headwater.co.uk who also offer walking tours. They were very good

I have no experience of them but there are a few companies offering walking in the Netherlands ;

https://www.sloways.eu/destinations/...in-netherlands
who offer various stages of the Pieterpad, a long distance path from Pieterburen in the north to Pieterburg, near Maastricht in the south.

https://bookatrekking.com/en/blog/hi...y-netherlands/
offers a few walks. two in the hilly south and one to three Wadden Islands, and my home town.

There are companies which offer similar things, some are Dutch but you could contact them perhaps to see if they offer the routes in English too.
https://www.eigenwijzereizen.nl/wand...ies/nederland/ for instance offer a lot of routes, Use the translate button on your browser to read the site.

My son and DIL are walking Hadrians Wall this year, in short stages as they have their Jack Russells with them. If I talk to him I'll ask what company they are using. I know that they are being picked up and taken to their B&B and them dropped back the following morning to the same spot.

Wow! Great tips! I hadn't come across some of these options before. Thanks!

bilbo and hetismij, thanks for the pointers to additional walking companies. I have just spent way too much time looking at new possibilities (including that walk that ends in Maastricht, a city that we really enjoyed ib 2023).

Finally saw my son today.
This is the company he is using https://maximumadventure.com/.

He said they have been very helpful responsive and communicative sorting their walk with the dogs.

Don't be put off by all the charity stuff they also organise - they do individual tours too. click on the customer type drop down menu.

I've bookmarked that one, too, hetismij. Another interesting one.

Glad to help AA.

My son is really looking forward to walking Hadrian's Wall.
A couple of year ago they did a similar thing in the Alps, but without the dogs so they had longer walks per day. Fit as they are (they both regularly run 20-30km cross country) they found those distances too far some days.