Inside the Collett’s Walk Pack: Everything you need for a hassle-free self-guided walking holiday
Author : Lara Ehmler
3rd June 2026
A commonly asked question for our Collett’s centre-based walking holidays is a simple one: how will I know where I’m going?
It’s a fair question, because the prospect of venturing into the mountains without a guide (or not as part of a group) is a matter of safety and can feel daunting, especially if walking holidays in the mountains are new to you. That’s why, at Collett’s, our mission is to help all our guests feel well-prepared and well-equipped, so that every mountain walk is a liberating and wondrous joy! The Collett’s Walk Pack is at the heart of this mission, and it is further reinforced by the presence of our Walks Teams on our centre-based hiking holidays in Austria, Italy (The Dolomites & Tuscany) and Switzerland.
After 30 years of delivering guided and self-guided walking holidays, there is a specific ‘Collett’s Experience‘, which is manifested in the quality of our itineraries, along with the empowering and reassuring support of our material and people. It amounts to a formula that perfectly blends independence with support, without interference. We provide everything you need to set off each day with confidence and positive anticipation. The formula also provides immense flexibility throughout, a unique quality of our walking holidays in Europe, whether you choose to negotiate a challenging trek, a moderate classic, or an easy valley stroll.
What is the Collett’s Walk Pack?
The Collett’s Walk Pack is a comprehensive set of walking resources (physical and digital) provided to every guest on a Collett’s centre-based walking holiday, including detailed Walk Notes, Holiday Handbook, area maps, and access to our navigation app.
From Day 1 we want you to feel completely at ease on the trails. Not dependent on a guide, not anxious about taking a wrong turn, and not spending your evenings squinting at a generic hiking app trying to figure out tomorrow’s route.
It’s a key aspect of what sets us apart from the rest to form the Collett’s walking holiday experience and it is consistently mentioned in our guest reviews.
Discover Our Centre-Based Walking Holidays
Tried & Tested Walks for all Abilities
The Walk Notes are the key component of your Walk Pack: a physical, printed collection of detailed walk descriptions for each of the walks we feature in your chosen destination. These walks have been researched by us over many years and our centre-based walks are checked carefully by our local Walks Teams to ensure that all route notes are as updated as possible. Year in, year out, we welcome comments and observations from our guests as a way of constantly recording the condition of our walks.
On a Collett’s centre-based walking holiday, we provide you with a mix of easy, moderate and challenging walks, so you can choose day to day how energetic or ambitious you would like to be. This flexibility is much valued by many guests, and it is quite different from our hut-to-hut and village-to-village holidays, on which your walk notes are designed simply to get you from A to B on a defined weekly itinerary.
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For each walk on our centre-based walking holidays you’ll find:
- Distance & Total Ascent – judge the day at a glance.
- Estimated Walking Time – based on a realistic pace, not optimistic guidebook times.
- Detailed Waypoint Descriptions – written in plain English, with landmarks, trail junctions and terrain changes clearly described.
- Points of Interest – including our favourite mountain huts (aka rifugios), which we would recommend for a mountain lunch, plus viewpoints that reward a short detour, and local facts that bring your walks to life.
- Grading & Terrain Notes – descriptions of what’s underfoot, where the walk gets more demanding and things to look out for.
The notes are written with the same dedication, whatever the grade of walk, so whether you are tackling an exposed, high-level ridge, or meandering in wildflower meadows, the same attention-to-detail has been applied with your safety and enjoyment in mind.
Are you new to self-guided walking holidays? If so, here’s a casual guide to help enlighten you.
Read The Guide
The Collett’s Navigation App: Simplifying Self-guided Walking
As digital products increasingly characterise our lives, your printed notes are complimented by the Collett’s self-guided hiking app, in collaboration with Ride GPS. We strongly encourage guests to use it alongside the route notes, rather than instead of them. Together, they make an effective combination.
The app includes:
- Offline GPS Maps – fully downloadable before you travel, so they work without mobile signal in remote areas.
- Live GPS Tracking – of your position in real time on a detailed map with (optional) audible prompts when a change of direction is needed.
- All Collett’s Walking Route Notes are pre-loaded – no searching, no downloading individual trails – your full Collett’s Walk Pack is ready to go!
- Local Recommendations – our favourite mountain huts, the best viewpoints and places of interest are flagged on the map.
- Public Transport Info – we mapped out all public transport journeys with matching links to bus timetables and ticket websites for easy planning.
The real value of the app reveals itself in unexpected moments: when the mist rolls in on a high ridge, when a path forks unexpectedly, or when you’ve been chatting and inadvertently missed a waypoint. A quick glance at your phone and you know exactly where you are! It is doubtlessly a key benefit to walking holiday navigation.
Your Walking Holiday Handbook
A user-friendly point of reference for holiday information and a font of local knowledge
- Walker’s Daily Checklist
- Knowing your Walk Pack
- Overview of all featured Walks – selecting walks at a glance
- Area & Village Maps – with key points of reference
- Non-Walking Options – ideas for rest days, including places of interest and alpine activities
- Mountain Safety
- Key Contact Numbers
- Local transport: bus routes, cable car timetables, gondola access relevant to specific walks.
A digital copy of your Holiday Handbook is available in your online portal a few weeks before your holiday. In your destination, a hard copy awaits you in your Walk Pack. The hard copy is particularly useful for selecting walks at a glance before delving into more detailed descriptions in the Route Notes.
Office Hour is a great companion to all our written material. Over the years it has become a highly popular Collett’s institution, whilst completely optional and informal. Guests simply enjoy meeting up with our Walks Team (and also chatting over a couple of sociable pre-dinner drinks with other guests) after magnificent days in the mountains. A quick chat with a member of our Walks Team (or, indeed, other guests) can often help you confirm your arrangements for the following day, especially if you are having difficulty deciding between two different walks. The reward is a relaxing dinner with everything sorted.
Discover more about Office Hour
How we harmonise the Walk Pack with the Collett’s Walks Team
The theory at Collett’s is that any centre-based walking holiday in Europe could unfold seamlessly with only your Walk Pack. However, we accompany these holidays with the dynamic presence of our Walks Teams in order to add a hospitable human touch, which walkers can fall back on for reassurance and local knowledge.
Each evening at Office Hour, our local Walks Team is available at either your hotel (or another one nearby) to answer questions and to talk through the route options that have taken your fancy for the following day. Inevitably, they can talk from a personal perspective about your chosen itineraries, adding a little bit of extra colour and depth to the descriptions in your Walk Pack. They can also share any current conditions or changes that might have occurred in the trails since our Route Notes were printed. They know the walks in your pack intimately and, with their real-time, nuanced knowledge, they can add a detail that swings your itinerary decision.
The result is a self-guided walking holiday that feels as independent as it does supported. Day to day, you can choose your own walk and set your own pace. After each walk, our team is always interested to hear your views, which they use as a means of constantly honing our route descriptions, before setting about helping you plan an even better hike for the following day.
Our first-time guest Sarah puts it perfectly: “Sils in the Engadin was the most beautiful place with stunning views. Each day, with the reassurance and extra guidance of the Collett’s Walks Team, we went on fabulous walks. The main highlights were the area, the stunning and varied scenery, the fantastically planned Collett’s Walk Pack (including brilliant app) and the food and wine!”
Read the Guest StoryFrequently Asked Questions
Yes! You will have access to a digital copy of your Walk Notes and Holiday Handbook via your online Collett’s guest portal, so you can familiarise yourself with the routes as your holiday approaches. We will also send you details for accessing our navigation App well in advance of your departure.
Both. Your Walk Notes and Handbook are provided in print upon arrival and as a digital PDF version in your online guest portal. The navigation App provides a fully digital alternative. Most guests use both to varying degrees during their time in the mountains.
Whilst all our Walk Packs are designed and set out in the same way, it goes without saying the content is very different for each destination, whether that’s the Italian Dolomites, the Swiss Alps, Austria or Tuscany. However, certain sections in our Holiday Handbook will be very similar across the board, such as the Walker’s Daily Checklist, Packing Suggestions and notes on Mountain Safety & Emergency procedures.
Absolutely! Routes are graded clearly and written to work for a wide range of fitness levels. Guests who prefer short and gentle walks, and those who want full-day mountain challenges will both find routes that suit them. At the heart of our centre-based walking holidays is choice and flexibility. You choose the grade of walk and the pace you do it at. On a larger scale, you choose the destination, the length of your holiday, how to travel, and whether to go half-board or self-catered.
This depends on the holiday. We provide a detailed printed & digital Walk Pack for our ‘Grand Tour of the Alta Badia‘ and ‘Discover the Dolomites‘ hut-to-hut treks, including matching navigation App routes. Our village-to-village holidays come with detailed digital Walk Notes via our navigation App, including digital maps. The App is also available offline, simply download the trip in advance. When you enquire, our UK Office Team will be only too happy to explain the Walk Pack situation for each of our holidays.
Visit our centre-based walking holiday page for full details on available destinations, accommodation, the walking, and available dates. You can also read about the Collett’s Experience to understand exactly how our centre-based holidays work.
