Saturday Walkers' Club

New Members

Welcome

The Saturday Walkers' Club is different from other walking clubs. If you are new to the club and are thinking about coming on one of our walks, please read this page first.

Introduction

Anyone can turn up to one of the club walks. There is no formal membership, no booking and no fee. On the day you will find that there is no designated walk leader. You can walk at your own pace, in the company of other club members or on your own, as you wish.

In return for this freedom, you must bring a copy of the walk instructions so that you can find your own way if necessary. Some club walks are published in the Time Out Book of Country Walks Near London (Vols 1 & 2); others are available on this web site for you to print out.

In the jargon, these walks are self-organising. The club publishes a date and time on this web site for a particular walk, so that like-minded people can walk together. Within this framework, you take part in one of the club's walks at your own risk: nobody else is responsible for you.

For a longer introduction to the club and its philosophy, and a brief account of its history, see About our Club.

Choosing a Walk

Walks used to be scheduled according to a rota published some years in advance in the two Time Out books, but this is no longer the case. You need to check This Week's Walks for the currently scheduled walks.

A group of volunteers selects the walks. Typically they only make their choices a week or so in advance, though some may publish a provisional rota much further ahead (this is currently the case for the Book 1 walks). Regular walkers bookmark This Week's Walks and refer to it during the week for the following weekend's walks.

There are usually three Saturday walks and two Sunday walks each weekend, plus midweek walks on the first and third Wednesdays of the month. At least one of the Saturday walks will be from Book 1; the others are chosen from the books and over 100 Extra Walks (those devised by club members since the books were published and which can be freely downloaded and printed from this site). A few walks will have a special theme (eg. Silent walks) which will be explained in the walk posting.

The volunteers will post details of the train to catch for a walk, giving the times from a London terminus and generally a few intermediate stations. They will have checked that the outward and return journeys are not disrupted by planned engineering works, but it is obviously your own responsibility to check the connecting train or tube services from your local station.

Because there is no advance booking, no-one can be sure how many people are going to turn up for a particular walk. You can get a general idea by browsing the Walk Numbers reports in the Forum & Other Announcements section of This Week's Walks. Typically around 6 to 15 people turn up for a walk; usually more on Saturdays than Sundays, and (obviously) fewer in bad weather. It's always possible that only a handful of other walkers will turn up, but this certainly won't be the case if you choose a popular-sounding walk in a well-known area (eg. the South Downs) on a fine summer day.

If you need more information to help you decide which walk to choose, go to that walk's page on the site and read its Introduction (and perhaps look at its Feedback page too).

Before the Walk

Check the weather for the area. You can simply watch a forecast on TV but many walkers bookmark the BBC Weather or Met Office web sites and use these. Remember that you can wait until the last minute to decide which walk to go on, or indeed whether to go at all: nothing needs to be booked in advance.

Choose appropriate clothes and footwear. Other walking sites can give you far more information about this. Walking boots are usually best in winter; trainers a reasonable alternative in summer. Depending on the season and weather forecast, come prepared for sun, rain, mud, etc. Bring plenty of water in summer, and food if you prefer not to have a pub lunch. A small first-aid kit is a good idea too.

Ensure that you have a copy of the Walk Instructions. If you have chosen one of the Extra Walks, print the walk document from the web site as directed. The instructions will either be in a separate pdf document or on the walk's html page (some of these have additional features allowing you to control exactly what gets printed). Even if you have chosen one of the Book walks and you have a copy of that volume, check the walk's page on the web site: there are more up-to-date directions for many of the Book walks which you can print out.

All the Book walks contain comprehensive walk instructions and a sketch map, but the level of detail in the Extra Walks is more varied. Those with minimal walk instructions require you to bring a suitable map and perhaps a compass; the walk document will say this and the walk poster should mention it too. If you don't have the relevant Ordnance Survey Explorer or Landranger maps, print the required map segments from a web site like Multimap or Streetmap.

Travel to a Walk

It is a feature of the club that none of the walks requires a car. With a few exceptions the walks start and finish at train stations, typically about an hour or so from central London (on a few walks you might also need to catch a bus).

If you plan to use the train at all regularly for travel to club walks, consider buying a Network Railcard. This costs £25 for 12 months and gives one-third off most off-peak rail journeys in the south-east for you and up to three adults travelling with you. See the Railcard web site for full details and restrictions.

If you travel from the London terminus, look around you for other walkers before departure. If you miss them or join the recommended train at a later station, try the second class carriages near the middle of the train. The group should be obvious when you arrive, but as a last resort wave the walking book or instructions about on the platform!

If you miss the recommended train and decide to catch a later one, check the walk document to see if there are details of a short cut or some other stratagem to help you catch up the main group. At worst you should meet them in the lunchtime pub and you can then join them for the rest of the walk.

If you prefer, you can of course drive to a walk. On a non-circular walk, check that the start and finish are on the same train line. Also, consider parking at the end of the walk and then travelling to the start by bus or train: this method works particularly well if you can do this by joining the recommended train.

On the Walk

The walks are self-organising and there are no designated walk leaders and no contact numbers. You are responsible for finding the way yourself, using your own copy of the walk instructions. It is tempting to simply follow someone else, but you do this at your own risk and you may end up going the wrong way. Everyone goes astray once in a while, especially after lunch when navigation is notoriously unreliable! Try to follow the directions yourself and don't be afraid to query other walkers if anything looks wrong. If you get lost it is best to backtrack until you reach a point where you know where you are in the directions.

The system might sound haphazard but in practice it works well. Smaller groups tend to stick together, with people taking it in turns to navigate. Larger groups often split up, allowing you to choose between a faster or a slower pace. It is much more relaxing than a led walk where everyone has to follow the walk leader's pace.

The walk instructions assume that you will be stopping for lunch at a pub and one or more will be recommended. You can of course bring your own sandwiches, but please do not try to eat these on the pub's premises: find a quiet place nearby and then rejoin the others in the pub for a drink if you wish. There will also be a tea room or a pub near the end of the walk where you can relax.

After the Walk

We greatly appreciate feedback from fellow-walkers so that we can keep the walk details up to date. If you notice anything wrong or ambiguous about the walk instructions, or would like to say something about the lunchtime pub or afternoon tea room (for example), please go to that walk's Feedback page and add a comment. We will try to fix problems before its next posting as a club walk, and your feedback will also alert anyone planning to do the walk independently.

We also like to know how many people turn up for each walk so that we can judge if we are offering too many or too few. Please check the Walk Numbers postings after a few days and add a brief comment if no-one else has yet done so. Most people add something about the walk itself, but the comments in this section disappear after a while and the walk's Feedback page is better for specific comments.

Other Activities

In recent years regular walkers have begun posting details of short walking holidays and social events on This Week's Walks. Generally a small group will arrange a weekend away, book seats at a theatre, etc, and then invite others to join them. These events are open to all. The event's organiser will make it clear what you are expected to do if you want to come along.

Summary

• The Club has no bank account, no insurance, no officers, and no legal existence. It only exists to allow like-minded independent people to walk together.
• The Club has no formal membership and anyone can come along to a walk, holiday or social event. You are responsible for your own safety and should take whatever precautions you feel are necessary when meeting new people in a social situation.
• There are no walk leaders and you take part in one of the club's walks at your own risk: nobody else is responsible for you. You must bring your own copy of the walk instructions so that you can find your own way if necessary.

Last Updated: Aug-10 by Sean.