Via Ferrata in the Dolomites
Big mountain rock climbing thrills with no need for skills
Extreme rating 6/10 | Highest peak Monte Paterno (2,746m) | keadventure.com
You might think the towering limestone peaks of the Italian Dolomite mountains with their imposing sheer white cliffs were the reserve of the experienced climber. But not so: thanks to fixed steel cables, ladders, bridges and other heavy duty climbing ‘protection’ that is known as via ferrata, or ‘iron way’. Originally installed during WWI, these routes have been upgraded so that even those with moderate scrambling skills can clip onto safety lines and access incredible climbing.
On this via ferrata adventure with KE Adventure, you’ll get the maximum mountain exposure – in every way – staying in high-mountain refuges for five nights.
You’ll get amazing views of the Tres Cime de Lavaredo, summit the 2,746m Monte Paerno, and scale the Torre de Toblin.
Price: from £1,095 (land only), inc. 2 nights hotel, 5 nights refuges, full board
Slovenian Alps
Trek through hidden Slovenia
Extreme rating 5/10 | Highest peak Mount Triglav (2,864m) | headwater.com
For a different perspective on central European Alpine culture, not to mention a glorious landscape of jagged limestone peaks, flower filled meadows, thundering waterfalls and half-timbered mountain villages, take a look at Slovenia.
Headwater’s hotel-to-hotel eight-night self-guided walking tour will take you through the Julian Alps, over the mighty Vrsic Pass at 1,611m and into the hidden Trenta Valley, where marbled trout swim in the crystal clear waters of the Soca River.
As you hike close to the Italian border you’ll pass many historical sites with reminders of the Napoleonic and WW1 conflicts, such as the Kluze Fortress. Further south, the landscape starts to feel more Mediterranean before you finish at the shore of the beautiful Lake Bohinj, under the mighty Mount Triglav.
Price: From £1219 pp, including breakfasts, 6 dinners and transfers
Tour de Mont Blanc
The great Alpine hike in hotels not huts
Extreme rating 7/10 | Highest point of the walk Le Brevent (2,525m) | ramblersholidays.co.uk
Linking the seven valleys that surround Western Europe’s highest mountains, this classic 107-mile, high-mountain hike is a must for any ambitious mountain walker’s bucket list.
Although there are rest days in Courmeyer and Les Houches, this is a tough hiking tour with shoulder-to shoulder views of peaks such as Mont Blanc, les Grandes Jorasses, Mont Dolent and Aiguille Vert. Hiking in a clockwise direction, you’ll cross from France, through Switzerland, Italy and then back to France to close the circle.
Although many other versions of this tour involve staying in mountain huts or camping, Ramblers’ tour puts you up in comfortable hotels and transfers your baggage between hotels, so all you need to carry is your daypack – and camera!
Price: from £1,599 for 13 nights B&B, inc. flights, transfers, and a guide.
Powder skiing in BC
The ultimate powder skiing road trip
Extreme rating 8/10 | Highest point Kicking Horse Resort (4,600m) | thestormchasers.ca
With waist-deep powder snow, heliskiing, snow-cat guiding and a fully loaded luxury tour bus for your base, the ‘Storm Chasers’ tour is as much like being on a big-budget movie as on a skiing tour. This week-long mountain road trip touring the Powder Highway of the Canadian Rockies has one objective: to find the deepest, freshest back-country powder snow for you to explore on skis or snowboard. No compromises.
The trip includes an overnight guided backcountry powder skiing trip to a heated expedition tent camp area, a full day of cat skiing and a heliskiing drop to cap it all off.
Ensuring your safety and the chances of finding the best deep, white stuff in British Columbia, expert ski guides will take you to the hidden powder fields and secret spots of resorts like Kicking Horse, Revelstoke, Whitewater, Red and Fernie.
Price: From £3,500 pp (land only) including all passes, accommodation, heli and cat skiing, breakfasts, lunches and guiding
Norway’s midnight sun tour
Exploring fjords, mountains and fishing villages in the Arctic circle
Extreme rating 2/10 | Maximum Altitude 421m | artisantravel.co.uk
The city of Tromsø in Northern Norway is sometimes called the ‘capital of the Arctic’ sitting as it does 350km north of the Arctic Circle. Split between the island of Trosøya and the mainland, the city is warmer than most places at this latitude thanks to the Gulf Stream and is surrounded by mountains and fjords.
Even from the city itself there is excellent hiking with stunning views back over Tromsø from the top of the 421m Mount Storsteinen, as well as the largest collection of the colourful distinctly Norwegian 19th Century wooden houses.
A self-drive five-day tour with a different hotel each night, Artisan Travel’s Tromsø midnight sun short break will guide you from Tromsø round the highlights of this northern wilderness, with activities such as glacier walking in the Lyngyn Alps and kayak tours around the golden sands of Sommarøy (Summer Island), just 36km west of Tromsø.
Also on the itinerary is the idyllic tour of Norway’s second largest island Senja, which you reach by ferry. This wild and rugged island is laced with well-marked hiking trails that quickly take you from coast to ragged mountain peaks in a dramatic glacial landscape, where everything above the tree line looks like a mountain!
Price: From £1,265 pp including flights, four different hotels, four breakfasts, one buffet dinner, rental car
Switzerland’s Via Alpina
Hike past the eiger, mönch and jungfrau over the roof of switzerland from Rosenlaui to Lenk
Extreme rating 4/10 | Highest pass crossed Huhtürli (2,778m) | stc.co.uk
This eight-day self-guided trek is the perfect way to sample the incredible Via Alpina long distance trail. Crossing eight alpine countries it includes some 5,000km of signed walking routes all the way from Trieste on the Adriatic Sea in the east to Monaco on the Mediterranean in the west.
Covering the Swiss highlights of the route this tour takes you on six days of spectacular high-mountain hiking through the Bernese Oberland. You’ll stay in chocolate box perfect mountain villages like Grindelwald and pass under the notorious and imposing north face of the 3,980m-high Eiger, which towers over it. You’ll also become well-acquainted with the other 4,000m Bernese giants the Mönch and Jungfrau, and the surreal azure waters of Oeschinen Lake at 1,500m.
Price: £799 pp in 3 star hotels, includes luggage transfers, breakfasts and flights
Himalayan cycling adventure
Ride the world’s highest roads from Manali to Leh, india
Extreme rating 9/10 | Highest road Khardung-La (5,359m) | redspokes.co.uk
According to the principle of ‘you only get out what you put in’, this 17-day bike tour in the Indian Himalaya will probably give you the most rewarding holiday of your life, because easy it most certainly is not.
Covering 296 miles over eight days of riding, you’ll pedal through the Ladakh region which bridges the world’s two highest mountain ranges, the Karakoram and the mighty Himalaya. High, stark and barely populated, this is the most remote part of India and cut off by snow for half the year.
The fact that Ladakh translates as ‘land of the passes’ gives you the best clue about the kind of challenging – and ultimately rewarding – adventure riding you’ll be getting stuck into on this tour. In total you’ll ride over five major passes, linking dozens of sinuous hairpins on rough dirt roads. Two of these passes will take you into the thin air of over 5,000m above sea level. Payback will come in the form of equally endless – though emminently quicker – descents.
After a day browsing cafés, historic sites and Buddhist monastries in Leh (see picture), you’ll face the Khardung-La pass, a climb that takes you from 3,600m to 5,359m in just 24 miles!
Price: From £1,295 pp (land only) including land transfers, accommodation and food, plus guide and support vehicle
Andorra’s Grand Route du Pays
Walk around a whole mountain kingdom in one week
Extreme rating 7/10 | Highest point Collada dels Pessons pass (2,810m) | visitandorra.com
The pyrenean principality of Andorra, wedged between Spain and France, makes up for what it lacks in size by delivering a spectacular variety of mountain scenery into a small space. Azure lakes, jagged peaks and wildflower meadows combine to make a stunning destination for the avid hiker. If you’re avid and fit, you should take a look at the 120km of the GRP of Andorra – a high-mountain walking trail which does a circuit of the entire country, and as such has to be one of the ultimate European hiking loops.
The GRP is broken into seven stages of around 12-20km each, with accommodation in mostly free mountain huts. Some are small, simple affairs with as few as 6 bunks, while others, like the Refugi de LiIlla at 2,480m have meal services, spaces for up to 60 people, a roaring fire, showers and toilets but, like most mountain huts, no mattresses! You will also have to carry all your own stuff on your back every day – you have been warned! There are three hotels on this route which can be added to the itinerary for a bit of luxury.
With the three final days chalking up an estimated average of eight hours hiking a day you’re going to need it. No one said walking around a country is easy…
Elbrus ski tour
Russian ski-touring adventure
Extreme rating 7/10 | Highest peak Mount Elbrus (5,642m) | mountaintracks.co.uk
Mount Elbrus is Europe’s highest peak, topping Mont Blanc by a good 800m, sitting just apart from the Caucasus range that separates Georgia from Russia to the north. In spring time, the valleys, passes and mountains of this range – which boast many 5,000m-plus peaks – offer exceptional ski-touring in a practically undeveloped mountain landscape.
To help with acclimatisation, your eight-day tour begins at the Ulla-Tau lodge at 2,350m above the glaciers of the Adyrsu Valley, before, in the second half of the week you head to the slopes of Elbrus.
Although the ‘skin’ up to the summit is not particularly technical, the altitude makes it seriously hard work. But it’s worth it, given the 3000m descent possible – something only possible in a few places in the world.
Price: From £2,100 pp (land only), including guiding, food, accommodation, transfers and uplift costs
Lares Trek, Peru
Machu Picchu without the crowds
Extreme rating 6/10 | Highest point Wacawasiqasi Pass (4600m) | tucantravel.com
The lost inca city of Machu Picchu in the Peruvian Andes sits securely on most people’s bucket list. The only fly in the ointment to visiting this magical archaeological site is that the most famous way to get there – the Inca Trail – is almost too popular.
This is where the Lares Trail comes in. Starting at Chancachaca, north of Cuzco in the Sacred Valley of the Incas, and finishing after at Ollantaytambo, close to the start point for the Inca Trail itself, this three-day trek, with two nights basic camping, through the magical snow-capped mountain scenery is virtually devoid of tourists, and a gem of a journey, which includes visits to several ancient Inca and pre-Inca sites. You’ll cap your Andean trek by heading to Machu Picchu by train, so you can get up early and enjoy it before the crowds.
Price: From £1,139 pp (land only) including 3 nights in hotels, 2 nights camping, 5 breakfasts, 2 lunches and dinners, guide
