Bespoke walking and trekking holidays
Our 2013 programme

Tweak your trip...

Do you like the look of an Alpine Exploratory trip but want to change a few details? Here are some options:

Add a rest day
There's no getting away from the fact that walking can be tiring. Depending on the type of walking you're used to, you might like to build in rest days every 2nd, 3rd or 4th day. You might want just one rest day in a 2-week trek.

Many of our enquirers ask to walk the whole of a trail in one go. If you have experience of walking for many days at a time, go for it!

Trek it faster or slower
Long distance paths lend themselves to a number of schedules, varying in stage length depending on which towns and villages are used for overnight stops. The choice of stops depends on details: distances, terrain, transport links and availability and quality of accommodation.

If our standard stages don't suit, let us know what you'd like and we'll suggest a faster or slower trek.

Walk different routes
If the area appeals but the walking is too simple or too hard, we can probably help. In most cases we can change the mix of routecards that we include in your info pack, drawing from our range of routes in the region.

Some areas are particularly suited to walks of all lengths and difficulties; other areas suit either easy valley walks or harder walks into the mountains.

Choose different accommodation
Where you stay will be a big factor in how your trip feels. If the schedule of accommodation on one of our trips isn't quite right, ask us for one that is!

We can meet all requests that are possible given the local facilities, from camping to luxury hotels. Self-catering chalets and cottages can be excellent for groups, giving a communal experience akin to a house party.

Hire a leader
There's no substitute for an experienced leader if you want a quick orientation in a new area. Your leader is there to maximise your experience, taking you to the best places and interpreting the local region.

Hire a leader for one day, a few days or even for your whole holiday.

Snowshoeing

Snowshoeing is simply walking in the winter using snowshoes on your boots. Snowshoes give a big surface area to stop you sinking in, plus some extra grip. There are no special skills to learn and within a few minutes you'll be adept at walking around in the snow. Typical snowshoe walks in the Alps explore forests, high meadows and small hills. Snowshoeing is atmospheric, exciting, easy to pick up, and most of all it's just great fun. Come on an Alpine Exploratory holiday and see what it's all about!

Snowshoeing: An introduction

Vaudoise Alps    Snowshoeing Guided snowshoeing 4 days Based in the Swiss Alps, enjoy gentle snowshoe walks and classic Alpine winter scenes					Chamonix    Snowshoeing Guided snowshoeing 6 days Experience snowshoe walks in the Chamonix valley with the Mont Blanc range as a backdrop

Fancy something totally different?

	June snow patches, French Alps

Instead of adapting one of our guided or self-guided holidays, you might like us to plan a totally new trip for you. We can provide tailor-made and fully booked walking and trekking programs for your party. Your holiday will be designed to maximise use of time, make best use of local transport, and reach the very best of the local scenery.

Your holiday could be just for yourself, for a group of friends or for a more formal group such as a club, office or charity. It could be following an established trekking route or heading firmly off the beaten track. You might want to complete your walking yourself, perhaps with the help of our routecards, or you might like to be led by an Alpine Exploratory leader.

Whatever your ideas, we will give you a reasoned and prompt response that answers your points and hopefully helps you in your planning. In fulfilling the regular requests that come in to us we often receive compliments on our helpful responses. Planning holidays is what we do and what we enjoy!

Even if your idea seems unusual, there's a good chance we have had a request like it! From high-altitude music festivals through charity fuindraising treks to more normal walking holidays, we can't promise anything but we do our very best to offer a good proposal to all our Bespoke enquirers.

Planning kept simple

We believe that the process of planning your walking holiday should be kept as simple as possible. There is an art to successful planning and it involves thorough research and efficient booking.

Groups

School, corporate, charity or just something a bit different?
If our standard guided trips aren't the sort of thing you're after, we can organise a special trip. It could be to the same region but in a different format, or it could be to somewhere totally new.

Numbers
Your group can be for any number of people. With larger groups we would advise on how best to split the party into manageable groups for the mountains. For school and youth groups we would normally price your trip to include free places for a certain number of teachers depending on the group's size, but this can be arranged to suit.

European trekking for school groups
Europe's mountains offer almost every type of mountain experience, from windswept moors to sparkling glaciers and from snowy forests to mountain huts. There is warmth and coldness available in every month of the year, if you know where to look.

School groups can spend a lot of time and effort raising funds for trips to South America and Africa, when simpler trips within Europe might offer equal adventure at lower cost. Additionally, participants will learn know how to carry out a trip to a region that they can reach easily on their own future trips with friends.

Alpine Exploratory recommends that participants in group trips to the Alps already have some good experience of walking in the UK. This way, new experiences can be put into context. Hopefully the group will be more alert to the new country and crucially more likely to keep up their interest in trekking once the trip is over.

On trek we take pleasure in passing over environmental and mountain-related knowledge and we encourage all group members to join in with their own knowledge. We offer to lead short sessions during the walks to do with mountain weather, navigation, or the local flora and fauna.

How to book a bespoke holiday

Contact us

Happy clients "The information was very useful. We were given a lot of good advice in planning the itinerary... "We would (& have) recommended you to others. Felt that the information & advice pre booking was particularly good, plus willingness & ability to tailor a holiday to the time we had available. Also several good suggestions for our free day." Bob and Clare (Bespoke TMB North, July 2008)

Please email us at info@alpineexploratory.com or contact us as follows:

Contact us

Please tell us roughly what you'd like to do. We'll ask you for more information about your plans and experience.

Our plan
We will send you our ideas for your trek together with a price. There is a great deal of flexibility and you can let us know about any alterations you'd like.

Booking
If you'd like to go ahead, we'll invite you to fill in our Booking form. This kicks us off in making arrangements.

Booking

Please join us!

Guided and Self-Guided Holidays