Trips that will mean New Year’s resolutions are kept

For anybody who resolves at New Year to get fitter, healthier; who pledges to complete a challenge for charity or add to their social circle, outdoor activity specialist Large Outdoors has the answer.

Pledge 1: Take up hiking or get fitter

Walking is one thing but for many people hiking seems to be a prospect of route-marches and feeling under pressure to keep up with the rest of the group. Many of Large Outdoors’s walking weekends are aimed at guests who are itching to explore Britain’s fantastic countryside but are uncertain as to how far they can go. “Many people who come on our weekends and are relatively new to hiking, surprise themselves as to how much they can actually achieve in terms of distance and level of difficulty”, says Gareth Williams, founder of Large Outdoors.

Sample weekend: A weekend walking in Captain Cook country around Whitby and along the Cleveland Way National Trail. Staying in the former mansion house that is now the YHA in Whitby with commanding views over the sea, the group goes on a couple of full day leg stretchers along the coast. There are plenty of stops along the way including tea shops and a pub which together with morale-boosting conversation puts paid to any thoughts of: “I can’t do this.”

The weekend includes bed and breakfast, a host from Large Outdoors accompanying the group and two days’ walking with a qualified guide. View details of our Whitby Walking Weekend here...

Pledge 2: Complete a charity challenge

As well as the day challenges where people can join a group to complete a hike up one of Britain’s biggest peaks or the Yorkshire Three Peaks, there’s also the opportunity to take on the ‘big one’ – hiking Ben Nevis, Scafell Pike and Snowdon, for charity.

Pledge 3: To expand the social circle

For those who have pledged to meet new people who share their interest for walking and getting outdoors, Large Outdoors’s social weekends aim to put the sociability factor into group walking.

With a host or ‘professional mingler’ staying with the group throughout the trip and providing much of the catering including the ice breaker meal on the Friday night, even people who dread having to walking into a room full of new people, soon forget about such fears.

Sample trip: A week’s walking in the Lake District, Friday 17th-24th June.

Staying in the plush holiday home, Alice Howe, close to Windermere, this week is aimed at walkers with some experience of tackling higher peaks as the 14-strong group will be bagging some of the Wainwrights including Blencathra, Helvellyn and Scafell Pike.

Apart from a couple of evening meals out, Large Outdoors provides the catering at the cottage and there’s plenty of down-time factored in particularly if any of the group wants to take a day off from hiking the fells.

Cost: £555 per person which includes seven nights’ accommodation, meals apart from two evenings out, Large Outdoors host and qualified guide. 

We no longer run our Lake District week but you can view our full schedule or walks and holidays in the Lake District here…