The End to End Trail - Land’s End to John O’Groats

Guidebook outlining the 1935km (1200 mile) walk across Britain from Land’s End to John O’Groats, concentrating on the 'missing links' between the main long-distance trails covered in other guidebooks. The route is divided into 61 daily stages averaging just less than 32km (20 miles).

These are a few of the many books I have read while researching Land’s End to John O’Groats. They have all been included because either they include valuable information, or they are thought provoking, or because they are (in my opinion) good books. Some are all three, but be warned that they are not all good literature. Many more people have written End to End books – for a more complete bibliography visit the website www.longwalks.org.uk.
Some of these books are out-of-print, but may be available from your local library for a small fee if you ask the librarian to track them down for you. Other than that, you’ll have to search the secondhand bookshops, or websites such as www.abebooks.co.uk and www.bookfinder.com.

Essential Guidebooks

If you want to follow a guidebook all the way from End to End you will need the following  – they contain maps and detailed route descriptions that are not included in this guidebook.

The South West Coast Path by Paddy Dillon, Cicerone, 2003

Walking Offa’s Dyke Path by David Hunter, Cicerone, 2001

The Pennine Way by Martin Collins, Cicerone, 2nd edition 2003

The West Highland Way by Terry Marsh, Cicerone, 2nd edition 2003

Recommended End to End Books

A Tour Through the Whole Land of Great Britain by Daniel Defoe, 1724–6
Penguin Classics published an abridged version in 1986. This isn’t really an End to End book, but does purport to document a series of journeys Defoe made, including to Land’s End and John O’Groats. It’s well worth reading.

A Walk from London to John O’Groat’s by Elihu Burritt, Sampson Low, Son & Marston, 1864

A Walk from London to Land’s End and Back by Elihu Burritt, Sampson Low, Son & Marston, 1865
Elihu Burritt was appointed US Consul to Birmingham by Abraham Lincoln. In 1863 he walked from London to John O’Groats, and the following year he completed his End to End walk by walking from London to Land’s End and back. He tends to concentrate on the grand buildings he sees and their wealthy and/or aristocratic owners, rather than the walking or the scenery – the books were written with an American agriculturalist audience in mind. It is perhaps not too surprising that his writing doesn’t chime well with modern walkers, as his motivation was very different.

Having said all that, he probably has to be given the credit for coming up with the idea of walking between Land’s End and John O’Groats. He did it in two parts only because he couldn’t start early enough in 1863. The second book improves a lot once he gets away from ‘civilisation’.

From John O’Groat’s to Land’s End by RN and JN (Robert and John Naylor), Caxton Publishing Co Ltd, 1916
This is a fascinating account of what may well have been the first continuous walk between Land’s End and John O’Groats. The Naylor brothers were well-to-do young men from Cheshire who were presumably inspired to attempt the walk by the writings of Elihu Burritt, although they don’t actually say so in their account of their walk. Although the book was published in 1916, they actually did the walk in 1871. John Naylor wrote up and published the account from their earlier notes after the death of his brother, 45 years after their expedition! The book is well written, and the Naylors had a modern approach to their walking that is easy to identify with today -– they were doing it for a challenge, and to see as much of the country as they could. They refused to take ferries, and walked every step of the way. There is rather a lot of interspersed historical fact, and also some historical myth, which is how the book ends up weighing in at 659 pages, but there is plenty of personal account in it as well.

Cross Country by Theo Lang, Hodder & Stoughton, 1948
Theo Lang was a journalist and novelist who walked a rambling route from Land’s End to John O’Groats in 1946, just months after the end of the Second World War. He set off on 17 March and finished just under five months later, having walked about 1500 of the 2200 miles he travelled. He wrote articles as he went for the Sunday Chronicle, and later wrote them up into a book. The account is an entertaining one by a professional writer, and has a similar feeling to John Hillaby’s account (see below). If you enjoy that, then this is worth seeking out.

The Big Walk by A Walker, Prentice-Hall, 1961
This is an account of the race from John O’Groats to Land’s End organised and sponsored by Billy Butlin, the holiday camp entrepreneur. It’s a hilarious read, and full of mind-boggling examples of what not to do. Billy Butlin conceived the idea of sponsoring a race after the publicity given to Dr Barbara Moore’s 22-day walk, presumably as a publicity stunt for his holiday business. The race was on roads all the way, and started from the John O’Groats Hotel at 5pm on 26 February 1960 – not the ideal time of year for the racers, but nicely timed before the start of the Butlin’s holiday season. Of the 715 starters, only 138 finished, and many of the competitors had no idea of what they were embarking on, only competing to win the £1000 prizes for the first man and woman to finish. The anonymous (presumably) author of the book didn’t quite finish the race, so isn’t included in the list of finishers. He did, however, write a very good account.
Journey Through Britain by John Hillaby, Constable, 1968 (widely reprinted)
The book that must have inspired a thousand attempts at walking from Land’s End to John O’Groats. John Hillaby did the journey in the late 1960s, mainly avoiding walking on roads, and wrote this extremely entertaining book about it. The only official long-distance path at the time was the Pennine Way, which he incorporated into his route (more or less). He also followed parts of what later became the Offa’s Dyke Path and the West Highland Way.

Turn Right at Land’s End by John Merrill, Oxford Illustrated Press, 1979
John Merrill is probably the most prolific long-distance walker in Britain, and this book is his account of the longest walk in Britain -– following the coast all the way round. He set off on 3 January 1978, finished on 8 November, and estimated the distance he walked at 6824 miles. Naturally the walk included joining Land’s End to John O’Groats, walking 3800 miles between the two. Oh yes, and he also walked Land’s End to John O’Groats three months earlier for a warm up. This walk qualifies for a ‘don’t try this at home’ warning, and you wouldn’t have thought it would have had many repeats, although a number of accounts have been written of similar walks since. The walk was obviously very hard both mentally and physically, and included a lot of unavoidable road walking and urban and industrial areas. It is well worth reading for his approach to preparation, and his experience of how to cope with very long walks. Where else are you going to get statistically valid estimates of the life expectancy of boots and socks, for instance?

Hamish’s Groat’s End Walk by Hamish Brown, Victor Gollancz, 1981 (also Paladin paperback)
This is Hamish Brown’s account of his 1979 walk from John O’Groats to Land’s End with his Shetland collie, Storm. The route was an indirect one, taking in mountains in Scotland (to complete his sixth round of Munros), England, Wales and Ireland, and the trip took about five months to complete. He generally kept to the mountains where he could, camping wild a lot, and making up for this by staying in comfortable hotels from time to time (a good way to travel, I think). The book is a very readable account which I found difficult to put down, and I have to recommend it strongly as excellent pre-walk mental preparation. There is also plenty of practical information in the book. It has a very good section on what he took and why, and an extensive bibliography.

Land’s End to John O’Groats by Andrew McCloy, Hodder & Stoughton, 1994 (also Coronet paperback)
An excellent book in which the author outlines three different off-road walking routes. This is a guidebook rather than an account of his journeys, and a recommended read for anyone planning to walk off-road from Land’s End to John O’Groats. It doesn’t give a lot of detail of the routes, so you would still need to do a lot of planning or improvising to follow one of them. The End to End Trail coincides in part with two of the routes.

One Woman’s Walk by Shirley Rippin, Shirley Rippin/Logaston Press, 1998
A well-written and relaxed account by an experienced walker. The route includes the Pennine Way and the West Highland Way.

One Pair of Boots by Tony Hobbs, Logaston Press, 2000
An account of the author’s walk from Land’s End to John O’Groats in 1997, this is well worth reading. He set out to follow one of Andrew McCloy’s routes, having done minimal preparation, and buying guidebooks and maps as he went along. The book is full of things such as his account of squeezing pus out of his toes, and a list of every pint of beer comsumed on the trip (285 pints of 83 varieties). Therapeutic reading for anyone who tends to overplan their life.

A Walk for Jim by Sally Thomas, published privately, 2001
A moving and readable account of Sally Thomas’s walk from Land’s End to John O’Groats in aid of leukaemia research – her son had died of leukaemia shortly before her walk. Her route was largely off-road and avoided hilly country, so is worth considering if you don’t want to climb many hills.

The Land’s End to John O’Groats Walk by Andrew McCloy, Cordee, 2002
This is a more detailed description of one of the three routes (the ‘Central Route’) outlined in Andrew McCloy’s earlier book. It is still not a detailed route description, though, and to follow the route described will require detailed planning with maps for the sections not covered by waymarked routes.

No Fixed Abode by Douglas Legg, Colby Press, 2002
An account of a 5000-mile coastal walk that in many respects bore more resemblance to the journeys of an old-fashioned ‘man of the road’ than a modern long distance walk.

Follow the Spring North by Christine Roche, Trafford Publishing, 2004
An account of a backpacking End to End walk, following a route that had been well researched. Worth reading for some of the route suggestions. Although this is an account of a walk, there is enough information about the route to be able to follow it accurately most of the way.)