Total Stats 🥾GR5 - 2,200km from Holland 🇳🇱 to Nice 🇫🇷
ℹ️🗓️ 70 days From: Hoek van Holland To: Nice. Rest days: 0 🏔️Terrain: concrete, roads, mountains tracks, trails, roads, slate, rocks - all shapes & sizes!
🥾Total Km: 2,141 - daily average 31
🥾Total Miles: 1,333 - daily average 19
🦶Total Steps: 2,757,161 - daily steps 39,388
⛰️ Total Ascent: 66,895m - 219,472 feet of elevation gain. 66.9 km of climbing!
⛰️ Total Descent: 66,826m - 219,246 ft of descent (That’s 438,718 vertical feet of up-and-down movement! 😳)
Biggest climbing day: 2,282m day 55
Biggest descent day: 2,334m day 70 - down to Nice
Earliest start time: 6.29am - day 48 - 1st proper day in the French Alps and I knew I had to get moving to finish in 70 days
Latest start time: 11.58am - day 26 (hard to get out of bed)
Earliest end time: 1.09pm - day 70 last day then day 52 stopped at 2pm Les Contamines (non stop rain day)
Latest end time: 9.13pm - day 21 - few miles past Langsur
💷💶Total costs: £2,682 / €3,164 💷💶Average costs per day (70): £38 / €45
💷💶Travel Costs: £265 /€313 - Eurostar to Rotterdam and flight home from Nice
💷💶Total costs not including travel: £2,417 / €2,851 💷💶Daily costs not including travel : £35 / €41
💷💶Misc costs: £145 / €171 New Gear - new hiking poles & new trainers
The main costs while hiking : Accommodation & Food
💷💶Total Accommodation Costs: £998 / €1,178
🏕️Cheapest campsite €8
Most expensive campsite €27.50 *still annoys me I paid this instead of wild camping
🏨Most expensive accommodation- Hotel €103 / £87 *worth every penny!
Wild camping 60% of the time - amazing I was able to camp so much!
Total camping 56 days in a bed 14 nights
Wild camped 42 days (2 big stretches - 14 days & 12 days)
Campsite/paid camping 7
WTMG 7 (€36 for the year) €5 per camp
Refuge 1 night - lower bunk bed
Hostels 4
Hotels 6
💷💶Total Food Costs: £1,273 / €1,503 💷💶Average Food Costs Per day: £18 / €21
Subjective feeling out of 10 on:
😀Total Enjoyment: 575/700 = 82% Enjoyment - this score is always massively impacted by the weather which was amazing on this trip!
😫Total Fatigue average: 235/700 = 34%
⛰️Total Ease of terrain: 241/700 = 34%
I only had really had one very bad day (day 49) where I felt horrendous but that could’ve been anything from; the heat, lack of water, electrolytes, food issues, tiredness, altitude, fatigue (9/10)
Challenges: unbearable heat at the start, hard concrete and road walking (but I was very much aware of this - so it’s wasn’t as horrendous). Not meeting many people (also expected) I thought I was going to meet more people in September doing the final section.
✨Highlights: the mountains, the views, the alpine lakes, the cols, the wildlife, the weather, wild camping so much. Just being out in nature. Great support on IG & FB - I really enjoyed reading comments and felt supported while on the journey.
Other random thoughts.
- this is not a hard trail which I know sounds weird. It’s a very walkable trail. You can make it easier or harder depending on the distances you want to cover and how much time you want to take so if you really wanna push yourself you can do and you will get the physical challenge that you’re after if you’re intimidated by some of the big climbs you only need to do one a day and stick to what is manageable for you.
- WTMG was incredible at the start and really made life so much easier for me in terms of being able to stay somewhere en route which didn’t cost me anything however later on towards the end of the trail there is no options.
- I think I was incredibly lucky with the weather especially in September going through the mountains. It was phenomenal. I had one night where there was a very bad thunder storm otherwise it was pretty much perfect weather every day. I’m talking blue skies and sunshine.
- I think the total costs of this adventure were very reasonable considering I was out there for 2 1/2 months.
- I wild camped 80% of the time and slept in my tent for 56 days and only stayed in 14 beds - the accommodation did cost me £998 which I suppose is expensive but I was expecting this as you’re going through more urban areas especially at the start and the hotels are always going to be towards the higher end between €80 and €100 if not slightly more so I think I did very well.
- Food is the other massive cost which I need to take into consideration. It did average out to about £21 per day which again I don’t think is excessive. I probably could’ve reduced the amount of drinks I was drinking at bars and places along the way - as it wasn’t essential- but sometimes I just wanted to sit down and take a load off or use the bathroom or to charge your electronics and the only way to do that is to buy a drink in one of those places .
I will be editing and putting out vlogs from the experience on the Tough Girl Youtube Channel.
There will also be detailed blog posts at www.toughgirlchallenges.com.