Doing the Walk Yourself: Costs

If you're thinking of walking from Land's End to John o'Groats then you have to give serious consideration to the cost. Taking three months to walk across the country might sound like an idyllic way to spend the summer, but if you run out of money halfway through and have to go home early, you'll be well hacked off, believe me.

The table below details everything I spent on accommodation and food during my walk. Note that these are 2003 prices, so things will be more expensive now. I haven't included all the beer I drank and I've omitted things like transport to and from the walk, entrance fees, clothes washing, phone calls and so on. It's also worth pointing out that I didn't skimp on my costs, and after I ditched my tent I stuck with Youth Hostels and B&Bs all the way, which increased the cost considerably. I ate in pubs a lot of the time and hardly ever cooked for myself, and I've also included the costs for when my girlfriend came to visit, when the budget went right out of the window. There are no details for 7-9 June because I stayed with my parents.

By the end of my walk I'd spent £1742 on accommodation and £1178 on meals, giving a total spend of £2920. That's an average of just under £33 per day throughout my 89-day walk. If I had camped throughout then I could have cut the accommodation budget to under £500 (or even less if I'd gone wild camping), but that would have been an entirely different experience.