Seeing a City the Old-Fashioned Way: One Step at a Time (Published 2018) (2024)

Last year, Butterfield & Robinson, the Canada-based travel company founded in 1966, reported a 20 percent average increase in yearly walking tour departures. Yet that growth was part of a broader, ongoing trend: The company’s total number of walking trips in 2016 was up 188 percent from 2010.

Backroads, the adventure travel company created in California in 1979, has also reported that walking and hiking tours are its fastest-growing segment, with double-digit growth. In March, the company reported that its walking and hiking segment more than tripled in size over the last five years — and it expects the numbers to continue to climb. This year alone it has new walking and hiking trips in Croatia and Slovenia; the Italian, French and Swiss Alps; Maine, Morocco, Namibia and Zimbabwe, Portugal, Provence and the French Riviera, and Scotland.

“Walking will be the ultimate way to explore” in 2018, the travel site Booking.com predicted last year, adding that 56 percent of travelers said they wanted to go on walking or hiking trips this year.

Walking, of course, has already been the ultimate way to explore — it’s a positively ancient way to travel. And the walking tour is an industry classic, predating smartphones, selfie sticks and status updates. Yet it’s a tour style that appears to be enjoying a bit of a boom, attracting ever more travelers interested in seeing a city in a slow fashion: on foot.

In addition to being able to better interact with a place and its people, companies have reported that many travelers have also taken an interest in the health benefits of walking or hiking while touring a destination. And for those who prefer privacy and going at their own pace, self-guided walking tours are blossoming — particularly in Europe.

Country Walkers, which has been offering tours for more than 38 years, has reported growing demand from travelers who want to explore destinations without a guide. In response, this year the company is offering new self-guided tours in popular places, including Andalusia, Spain and Portugal. The “Spain: Andalusia & Seville” self-guided tour begins in Seville and includes walks through cork oak forests and stays at family-owned inns (from $2,698 a person, based on double occupancy). Other self-guided tours include “Portugal: Porto, Minho & Douro Valley” (from $3,898 a person, double occupancy) and “Portugal: Lisbon & Undiscovered Alentejo” (from $3,798 a person, double occupancy).