Why should I start walking?
Whether you're walking to work or to the shops, stepping out at lunchtime or taking the dog for a walk, walking cam be simple to fit into your everyday life. It's simple, free and one of the easiest ways to get more active, lose weight and improve your physical and mental health.
Often overlooked, a regular walk can help build stamina, burn calories and improve your heart health. The best part is that you don't have to walk for hours. A brisk 10-minute walk every day has lots of health benefits; it also counts towards your 150 minutes of weekly exercise.
What are the benefits of walking?
- It can be done anywhere and anytime
- It's free/low-cost
- Regular walking can allow you to keep fit and meet new friends
- Gives you more energy
- Meet new people
- Reduce stress, helping you to sleep better
- Keeps your heart strong
- Helps to maintain your weight
- Helps to maintain healthy bones, muscles and joints
- Reduces back pain
- Keeps you motivated
What is Walk Together?
We have a big ambition, we want to inspire people in Leicestershire, Leicester and Rutland to walk more often, particularly those who currently don't incorporate walking into their everyday lives. We want to help you find your own motivation to walk.
Walk Together offers a regular programme of free, sociable, and accessible group walks within Leicestershire and Rutland led by trained volunteer walk leaders. Walk Together is coordinated, developed and delivered via a partnership between Active Together and your Local Physical Activity and Health teams.
Walk Together guided walks are ideal for people who have done little to no exercise in the past. They vary in length, typically between 45 - 60 minutes, on well maintained, flat surfaces. Every walk encourages individuals to go at their own pace, and there will always be a Walk Leader to ensure no one is left behind.
Download our Walking Guidebook
Includes top tips to walk more everyday, ideas for family walks, walking with a health condition and much more. Let's Get Moving!
Walk Together Walking Guidebook
Want to choose your own walking route?
The best way to get around Leicestershire is on foot. Most sights and attractions are within a short stroll, and many of our city centre streets are pedestrianised. Click here to access the best walking maps throughout Leicestershire.
Sometimes you want to explore a new place by foot and find local routes that you never knew existed.
Choose How You Move have many walking maps and guides for areas across Leicestershire, Leicester and Rutland. These give you the opportunity to find new walks and keep things interesting.
You can also find family walks, historic walks, quizzes, and much more!
Frequently Asked Questions
Hear from our Walk Together Champions!
Other ways to get involved
You can walk at any pace, alone or with others. You could bring a dog or a buggy and even use walking poles if you have them. View the local parkruns available.
Receive a tailored walking plan to help you increase your daily steps at a pace that works for you. For anyone 18+ wanting to become more active or living with a long-term health condition such as diabetes or obesity. *For FREE access use code: Let’s Get Moving*
Visit 'what's around my way' to find your local parks, open spaces, walking and cycling routes. Plus, find some ideas on what to do when you get there!
The Ramblers is a charity dedicated to removing barriers so everyone can enjoy walking in green spaces and to preserving and improving hundreds of thousands of miles of well-loved paths, tracks and trails across England, Scotland, and Wales.
Creating environmentally positive, local change.
Upcoming walks in Leicester City
There are lots of events happening in Leicester and Leicestershire that you could take part in. Take a look at our upcoming events here.
Subscribe to the FREE Leicester City Council monthly newsletter.
Explore the different walking routes throughout Rutland.
Oakham Canal Green Corridor Project
Guided History Walks, Guided Nature Walks and Guided Bat Walks.
Live Well Leicester offers a wide range of free led health walks across Leicester.
Volunteering in physical activity and sport has so many great benefits. Here you'll find many useful links to get involved - including walking opportunities.
Active Apps
If Ordnance Survey maps aren't for you, why not explore the wealth of new walking apps that exist.
From walk mapping to interactive adventures, whether you're exploring new parts of your local area or venturing further afield to achieve your daily step count, we've rounded up some of the best apps to map and guide you and your family on your way!
Find new walks based on your location. Simple photo guides help you navigate while nifty tips point out things of interest. Sign up to walking challenges or even upload your own walks!
A community of runners, walkers, and cyclists who combine regular exercise with charity to help out local communities.
Anonymously record every minute of walking you do. Just pop your phone in your pocket and away you go! The app tracks your steps, shows you your achievements and gives you tips to boost your activity.
Walkmeter tracks more than 250 statistics, plus maps, graphs, splits, intervals and zones, temperatures and weather conditions.
A particularly fun and educational way to map your walks, World Walking enables you to select from over 400 of the world’s most famous trails to build up your step rate over time.
There are millions of geocaches hidden around the world. The Geocaching app provides tips and descriptions, has maps and driving directions.
Wherever you are, PictureThis can identify the local or global species of plants, flowers, and trees that you’re bound to encounter outdoors.
If your child is a budding bug hunter, they will surely enjoy Picture Insect. The app allows you to take pictures, or even just upload photos, of insects so that it can identify them for you.
Star Walk 2 is a stargazing app that uses your device’s sensors and GPS to identify the stars, planets, and constellations in the night sky.
Identify dog breeds using your camera, or by uploading a photo. The app can identify mixed breeds too! There are opportunities to catch every dog breed, much like Pokemon Go.
With Greg, it's all about connecting to plants. With the Auto-Magical Plant Identification, you can scan any plant (for free!) and Greg’s PlantVision will identify the species and tell you all about it.
Warblr is an iPhone and Android app that automatically recognises British birds by their song. The way in which it works is simple – make a recording with your smartphone, and Warblr will identify the species of bird/s that can be found in that recording!
You're performing the exercises linked from our website at your own risk
Whilst every effort has been made to verify the information on the Active Together and associated pages, Active Together is not responsible for the accuracy or content of external websites. Whilst taking part in physical activity, participants should ensure they take part at a level which is appropriate to them and their health and are responsible for ensuring they check the credentials and health and safety requirements for each activity. It is recommended that participants follow the Chief Medical Officers Guidelines for physical activity. Participants will choose to utilise these links and take part in activities at their own risk.
If you're unsure about your ability, it might be wise to start gradually and build up. Please feel free to refer to the UK Chief Medical Officer's Physical Activity Guidelines when determining the level of activity appropriate to you.
Make sure you warm up and cool down to prevent injury, and make sure you keep hydrated.
Stop the exercises immediately if you feel faint or unwell, and if you still feel dizzy or unwell have a rest. Next time try something less strenuous, building up your activity gradually.
