Planet’s best bits
LONELY Planet has a brand new “best of” series listing all the worlds’s top sights, itineraries and local secrets. Compiled by its experts, it has insider tips, inspiring photos, handy itineraries and planning tools so you can make the most of your break. The series kicks off this month with Best of Australia, Best of Germany, Best of Ireland, Best of Italy and Best of USA.Go to lonelyplanet.com. PULL on your boots and take in the views on the treks offered by these great walking festivals held around the country this summer. WALK THIS WAY: This event has a varied range of walks to suit almost everyone. If you love trains, the Mini Challenge Day 1: Let the Train take the Strain gives you the chance to take ride from Beccles to Oulton Broad then walk back along the Angles Way. You will have the River Waveney on one side and marshland on the other, passing Suffolk Wildlife Trust’s Carlton Marshes Reserve on the way. May 24, £10 including rail fare, www. suffolkwalkingfestival.co.uk. PUT YOUR FEET UP: Glenhaven, in the quaintly named village of Sweffling, sleeps up to four in two bedrooms. A week self-catering costs from £421 through Sykes Cottages. Ref. 930270, SykesCottages.co.uk, 01244 352 300. WALK THIS WAY: Arguably Britain’s biggest outdoor festival, this popular event celebrates its tenth anniversary this year. At its heart are guided themed hikes.
One of them, Helvellyn by Sunrise, has a 2am start from Wythburn Church, hopefully by moonlight. Walkers take in woods before joining a fell track climbing above Comb Crags to Helvellyn’s summit.
Then it is back down over Nethermost Pike, High Crag and Dollywaggon Pike, to Grisedale Tarn and the Raise Beck path to Dunmail Raise and back to the church. May 22, £30, keswickmountainfestival.co.uk/activities/hike. PUT YOUR FEET UP: Stay in the heart of Keswick in Kingfisher, one of the half a dozen new apartments at Easedale House.
The Festival Village is a short walk away. Sleeping two, a week self-catering costs from £375 with Cumbrian Cottages. Ref: CC112145, www.cumbrian-cottages.co.uk, 01228 599 960. WALK THIS WAY: With 46 walks, this festival offers lots of ways to explore this beautiful county. The opening day of the festival features a walk that takes in a special crossing of the River Wye at Mansell’s Ferry MidsummerMid Walking Festival, it has routes that for just one day – the last time the public used take in both malt whisky country and the
beaO beachesOne walkof theis a Moray wildlife coast. tour on the River this crossing was 1900. Take the opportunity to visit Homme House and its parkland for a family history tour. Then it is on to Fownhope FindhornFind guided by biologist Bob Laughton. for a pub lunch before catching the bus to It follows a loop along the riverbank by an Holme Lacy. June 18, £10 including coffee and old salmon netting station, over the A96 Bridge, ferry fare, walkingfestival.com. pastpas the river level gauging station and back to PUT YOUR FEET UP: Near the village of the start at the Forres recycling centre. Kingsland and five miles from Leominster, AlongA the way you can learn about salmon Croft View is on the first floor of a red brick fishingfish and the giant hogweed – one of the barn on a farm used to breed horses. The onealienalie plant invaders that can burn skin and bedroom property that sleeps two costs from damagesdam our river habitat. June 18, £6, £322 for a week’s rental with Sykes Cottages. moraywalkingfestival.co.uk.mo Ref: 905755, www.SykesCottages.co.uk, 01244 4 PUTPU YOUR FEET UP: St Orans cottage, which is 352 300. set in a country estate, is well placed for the fes festival’s walks.
The whitewashed crofter’s cottage in Du Dunphail near Forres sleeps two with a week’s se self-catering starting at £482 through Scottish Co Cottages. Ref: CC511327, scottish-cottages. co co.uk, 01228 406 731. WALK THIS WAY: Billed as Scotland’s