Two of the best long-distance hikes in the UK

This article was produced by National Geographic Traveller (UK).

Few nationalities have an appetite for long-distance walks quite like the British. Even on an island prone to seaborne storms — where spring can segue directly into autumn and where upland visibility can extend no further than an outstretched hand — countless anorak-clad souls tramp a substantial network of long-distance paths: from the South West Coast Path riding atop the granite cliffs at Land’s End in Cornwall, to the Cape Wrath Trail ending at a lonely lighthouse in the Scottish Highlands.

Long-distance rambling in Britain is part of a correspondingly long tradition. In one sense, the activity began here in 1965 with the unveiling of the Pennine Way — a 268-mile route along the spine of Northern England, connecting Derbyshire fells with the Scottish border, and celebrating 60 years in 2025. It was the first of the National Trails established in the wake of the National Parks movement a decade earlier — part of a wider post-war effort to open the landscape to the masses. There are now 16 official National Trails extending across the length and breadth of England and Wales — generally with transport and accommodation options for hikers en route — while Scotland has its own separate set of Great Trails.

In a truer sense, the story of long-distance walking in Britain stretches into the depths of prehistory — to a time when walking was the only means of getting from A to B. The Ridgeway was inscribed as a National Trail in 1973 but is also claimed to be Europe’s oldest path — first walked in the Stone Age, as attested to by the prehistoric landmarks along its route. In a similar way, the Hadrian’s Wall Path officially became the 15th National Trail in 2003 — though that’s not to say the same route wasn’t trodden by sandalled Roman centurions two millennia before leather-booted hikers turned up.

These paths were not necessarily created by any one group of people at any one time — their course defined by the coalescing footprints of pilgrims, merchants, marching armies and drovers over centuries, and deepened too by the grooves left by carriage wheels and the stamp of horse hooves. In the minds of many, to walk these long paths is to enter communion with the past: to tread in the footsteps of bygone wayfarers and to imagine their company by your side.

For others it’s a much simpler pleasure. There is tremendous fun to be had striding across dale and over fell, up mountain gradient and along the precipice of a wildflower-capped sea cliff. It’s more rewarding to see the British landscape unfurl over many days, coming to intimately know its contours and feel its geological constitution underfoot. And enduring the wilds of the British weather is always easier, knowing there’s a warm pub to hole up in at the end of the day.

Itinerary 1: Anglesey Coastal Path

Start and end point: Holyhead
Distance walked: 135 miles
Average length: 12 days

In 2012, Wales became the first country in the world to have a footpath marked out along its entire coastline. If you don’t have a few months spare to tackle the full 870-mile odyssey, consider one much-celebrated part of it instead.

The 135-mile long Anglesey Coastal Path laps an island known as ‘The Mother of Wales’ because produce from its fertile fields once fed the mainland. It’s also a motherland of Welsh language and culture, and by tracing its shores you get a sense of the wider Welsh coastline in miniature. There are mighty castles such as the medieval stronghold at Beaumaris; soaring lighthouses like those at South Stack and Penmon; and pretty, pastel-hued seaside towns like Menai Bridge and Rhosneigr. But most of all this route is about beaches. Anglesey claims the finest in Wales — crescents of sand wide open to Irish Sea winds, where the incoming tide laps at your walking boots. The beaches are varied: mostly muddy and pebbly in the south east; wide and spectacular in the south west; small and secluded in the north.

Another appeal of this path is its accessibility — the peaks of Eryri (Snowdonia) may reign on the southern horizon, but the route itself is fairly level. You’ll also be richly rewarded for your efforts at a number of accomplished restaurants along the trail, often making the most of Welsh lamb and the island’s highly prized sea salt.

1. Traeth Porth Wen
The northern coast of the island is the quiet and relatively undiscovered side of Anglesey, the shoreline Swiss-cheesed by little coves. Here, the coast path skirts eerie, little-visited Traeth Porth Wen, where the abandoned chimneys and kilns of a Victorian brickworks — inactive for a century — rise over a quiet, pebbly beach. Wander among the roofless structures, listening to the hush of the waves. Close by you’ll find the pretty village of Cemaes, huddled around a small harbour and with a number of cafes.

2. Penmon
The rockpools here mark the easternmost point of Anglesey. Presided over by a sullen black-and-white lighthouse, this headland offers panoramic sea views: out to the uninhabited Ynys Seiriol (known in English as Puffin Island), once a retreat for Christian hermits and now a habitat for grey seals. The island is out of bounds to humans, who can only gaze at it wistfully from the shore or else circumnavigate it on a boat trip.

3. Menai Bridge
The historic Menai Suspension Bridge links Anglesey to the mainland, swooping over the whirpools of the Menai Strait. Set where the bridge lands on the island, the town of Menai Bridge is a gastronomic centre. Among the stars here are much-loved tapas joint Freckled Angel and seafront bistro Dylan’s. You’ll need to clean off your boots to dine at Sosban & the Old Butchers, where Michelin-starred tasting menus are only revealed on arrival.

4. Plas Newydd
Take a detour off the path on the southeast coast to enter this National Trust estate, whose woodlands are a rare redoubt of red squirrels in Britain outside Scotland. You’ll find a squirrel hide in the section of the grounds close to the Menai Strait; the creatures are most active in autumn, but can be seen year round. There’s plenty else beside the resident rodents: terraced Italianate gardens, a secret treehouse and of course a grand stately home, containing one of the UK’s largest murals, painted by Rex Whistler.

5. Llanddwyn
The most celebrated beach in Anglesey (and possibly all of Wales) lies on the west coast: Llanddwyn, a sandy strip fringed by pine forests. It culminates at a tidal island, capped by a row of whitewashed pilots’ cottages, easy to walk to on all but the very highest spring tides. Llanddwyn Island was reputedly the home of St Dwynwen, the Welsh equivalent of St Valentine; look out for her holy well, where legend tells that fishes spell out messages to lovestruck pilgrims through bubbles.

6. Barclodiad y Gawres
This Neolithic burial chamber is set on the island’s west coast, perched on a headland protruding into the Irish Sea breakers. The grassy mound is one of the most important prehistoric sites in Wales — inside, archaeologists have found evidence of a millennia-old stew containing eel, frog and grass snake. It’s a fine place to have a more conventional picnic in the present day, pondering the passage of time as gulls wheel overhead.

Itinerary 2: Hadrian’s Wall Path

Start point: Brampton
End point: Corbridge
Distance walked: 42 miles
Average length: Four days

Construction of Hadrian’s Wall began in 122CE, but the route was in some way plotted some 300 million years earlier with the emergence of the Whin Sill: a volcanic outcrop across the neck of Northern England, atop which Roman engineers cannily plonked their defences.

Today, the Hadrian’s Wall Path runs for 84 miles from the Solway Firth to where the Tyne ebbs out into the North Sea. But its most spectacular portion lies at the centre: where the path rises from green fields to crest these volcanic crags, and where Roman fortifications are at their most intact. From this blustery escarpment you can gaze across the parapet to the Caledonian frontier as Roman sentries did, and idle at ‘milecastles’ — watchtowers along the path, where you might find yourself alone with the ghosts of the vanished legions.

Along the way you can find characterful pubs and villages in which to rest, as well as stargazing centres that make the most of the pristine conditions of the Northumberland International Dark Sky Park. Easy access is assured by the little bus that shuttles up and down the path: the wonderfully named AD122.

1. Lanercost Priory
It may not date back to Roman times, but Lanercost Priory is one of the great landmarks on the western reaches of the wall: a 13th-century monastery distinguished by its extraordinary vaulting. These days, it’s a point of pilgrimage — in part for the adjoining tearoom in the old abbey farm, where walkers can fortify themselves for the miles ahead with the likes of Cumberland sausage, mash and gravy.

2. Gilsland
The pretty village of Gilsland guards the western rampart of Walltown Crags — a fine spot to stop before striking out on the march along the escarpment. As well as cafes and pubs, you can explore the Roman Army Museum, where exhibits include the only Roman helmet crest ever to be discovered, which looks a little bit like a Mohican.

3. Twice Brewed Inn
The most renowned pit stop on the path is this pub, in business since at least the 18th century, set roughly at the halfway point of your walk. As well as guest rooms named after Roman emperors and hearty pub food, the inn has its own microbrewery and a stargazing centre with telescopes (plus a planetarium on hand for overcast nights).

4. Housesteads
Britain’s most complete Roman fort can be found at Housesteads, guarding the edge of an empire that stretched from this rainy frontier to Africa and Arabia. It’s set beside the path: wander among the foundations of gatehouses, barracks and the bathhouses where troops would have warmed numb limbs after a long shift on the wall.

5. Carrawburgh Mithraeum
One of the most mysterious spots along the wall is the Carrawburgh Mithraeum — the remains of an underground temple at the eastern end of the escarpment, towards the end of the hike. In the third century, Roman soldiers gathered here to worship the god Mithras, most famously depicted as sacrificing a sacred bull.