7 questions answered about your first walking holiday

We cater for all fitness levels across our walking and trekking trips. While the required fitness level can vary depending on the trip you choose, for the majority of our walking holidays, no training is needed.

We've given all of our tours a grade - including Leisurely, Moderate and Challenging - which also helpfully indicate how much preparation you may need to do before you depart for your trip.

When researching guided walking holidays, check our individual trip pages to find the grade.

Yes, most of our walking trips have rest days built into the itinerary. Again, check the grade of the tour – easier graded trips are more likely to have rest days and shorter walking days. If you’re keen to have plenty of time to try local food and drink and explore the destinations in depth, we recommend you opt for an easier grade walking holiday.

If you feel you need an extra day to relax during your holiday, it is possible to opt out of walking. Your Explore Leader will arrange transport for you if needed. You can increase your amount of ‘downtime’ by choosing an easier grade trip, which have plenty of rest time so you can rejuvenate after each day’s walking.

Take a look at our centre-based walking trips - on these holidays, you’ll stay at the same accommodation throughout and take different walks each day. If you’re on one of these trips you’ll have the option to stay and do your own thing for the day if you’d like to.

This will vary depending on where you decide to go and we provide detailed advice on individual trip notes. Our general tip for walking clothing would be to pack layers as the weather can always be unpredictable. A decent pair of walking boots is essential. We recommend getting walking boots that are a little larger than your normal shoe size, to allow for a thick pair of socks (or even liner socks and thick socks together to prevent blisters).

And don’t take new boots on your walking holiday – try to break them in by wearing them around the house or on walks before you leave for your trip. You may want to consider a pair of trekking poles for harder graded trips.