GR5: Holland to Nice — The Total Stats, Costs and Lessons From 70 Days on the Trail
2,141km. 1,333 miles. 70 days. Zero rest days. One incredible adventure.
On 20 July 2026, I set off from Hoek van Holland in the Netherlands with a goal: to hike the GR5 all the way to Nice in southern France.
On 27 September 2026, I arrived in Nice, having spent 70 days walking my way south through the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Switzerland and France.
It was a journey of concrete, roads, trails, slate, rocks, mountains, alpine lakes, incredible views, wild camping, sunshine, heat, tired legs and a lot of determination.
I'd set myself an ambitious challenge, and while completing the route was always my main priority, I was also aiming for the first women's Fastest Known Time (FKT).
I've now submitted my GPS tracking and supporting data and am waiting to hear back from the FKT team.
In the meantime, I've been going through my numbers and pulling together the total stats from the adventure. I wanted to share everything, including how far I walked, how much climbing I did, what it cost, where I slept, what I enjoyed and what I probably wouldn't rush to do again!
So, here are the numbers behind my GR5 adventure.
The GR5: My total hiking stats
Statistic | Total |
Total time | 70 days |
Start | Hoek van Holland, Netherlands |
Finish | Nice, France |
Total distance | 2,141km / 1,333 miles |
Average daily distance | 31km / 19 miles |
Total steps | 2,757,161 |
Average daily steps | 39,388 |
Total ascent | 66,895m / 219,472ft |
Total descent | 66,826m / 219,246ft |
Rest days | 0 |
That's 66.9km of climbing and almost the same amount of descending.
My total vertical movement, combining ascent and descent, was approximately 438,718 feet.
Just let that sink in for a moment!
And all of this was completed over 70 consecutive days, without taking a single rest day.
The biggest climbing and descending days
My biggest climbing day came on Day 55, when I gained 2,282m of elevation.
My biggest descent was saved for the very last day. On Day 70, as I made my way down into Nice, I descended 2,334m.
A fitting way to finish!
What time was I starting and finishing each day?
One of the interesting things about looking back at the stats is seeing just how much the daily routine varied.
Earliest start: 6:29am on Day 48. It was my first proper day in the French Alps, and I knew I needed to get moving if I was going to finish within my 70-day target.
Latest start: 11:58am on Day 26. Sometimes it was simply hard to get out of bed!
Earliest finish: 1:09pm on Day 70, when I arrived in Nice. Day 52 was my next earliest finish, at 2pm, after a day of non-stop rain in Les Contamines.
Latest finish: 9:13pm on Day 21, a few miles beyond Langsur.
Not every day followed a perfect schedule. The weather, the terrain, how I was feeling and the practicalities of finding somewhere to sleep all played a part.
That's one of the realities of a long-distance hike: you can plan as much as you like, but every day brings something different.
How much did the GR5 cost?
One of the questions people often ask about long-distance hiking is how much it costs.
I was away for two and a half months, travelling across several countries and covering more than 2,100km. I think the final total was pretty reasonable for an adventure of this length.
My total expenditure was £2,682 (€3,164), including travel to the start and home from the finish.
Expense | Total |
Total cost, including travel | £2,682 / €3,164 |
Average daily cost, including travel | £38 / €45 |
Travel costs | £265 / €313 |
Total cost, excluding travel | £2,417 / €2,851 |
Daily cost, excluding travel | £35 / €41 |
Accommodation | £998 / €1,178 |
Food | £1,273 / €1,503 |
Miscellaneous costs | £145 / €171 |
My travel costs covered the Eurostar journey to Rotterdam and my flight home from Nice.
The miscellaneous spending included new hiking poles and a new pair of trainers.
The two biggest expenses were accommodation and food, which is hardly surprising when you're living on the trail for 70 days.
Accommodation: £998
I spent a total of 56 nights camping and 14 nights in a bed.
Of those 56 camping nights, 42 were wild camps, including two long stretches of 14 and 12 consecutive days.
My accommodation breakdown was:
Wild camping: 42 nights
Campsites and paid camping: 7 nights
Welcome To My Garden (WTMG): 7 nights
Mountain refuge: 1 night
Hostels: 4 nights
Hotels: 6 nights
The accommodation categories above reflect the breakdown I recorded during the hike, with the camping total also including the WTMG stays.
I was genuinely amazed by how much wild camping I managed to do. Being able to pitch my tent and spend so much time outdoors was one of the highlights of the whole experience.
The cheapest campsite I stayed at cost €8. The most expensive was €27.50, which still annoys me because I could have wild camped instead!
My most expensive accommodation was a hotel costing €103, or approximately £87. And that was worth every penny.
Sometimes you just need a proper bed, a shower and a little bit of comfort.
Welcome To My Garden
Welcome To My Garden was particularly useful at the beginning of the hike.
For €36 for the year, I was able to access places to camp along the route without paying for conventional accommodation. That worked out at roughly €5 per stay across my seven nights.
It made a real difference to the logistics and budget, especially in the earlier sections.
However, towards the end of the route, there were fewer suitable WTMG options along my way, so I couldn't rely on it to the same extent.
Could I have spent less on accommodation?
Possibly, but I don't think I did badly.
I spent 42 nights wild camping and 56 nights in total sleeping in my tent. I was already making use of one of the cheapest ways to travel, and there are limits to how much further you can reduce accommodation costs when you're hiking through towns, villages and more expensive regions.
You can wild camp when it's appropriate and practical, but you also have to consider the route, local restrictions, weather, access to water and whether you need somewhere safe to rest.
I could probably have saved a little more, but I don't think the accommodation bill was unreasonable for 70 days on the trail.
Food: £1,273
Food was my other major expense.
I spent £1,273 (€1,503), averaging £18 (€21) per day.
For someone hiking an average of 31km a day, often with significant elevation gain, food is not an optional extra. You need to keep eating and drinking to fuel the effort.
I could probably have reduced my spending on drinks in bars and cafés along the way. But sometimes I wanted to sit down, take a load off my feet, use the bathroom or charge my electronics.
Often, buying a drink was the practical way to do that.
Those little stops can add up over 70 days, but they also make life on the trail a bit more comfortable.
Hiking gluten-free wasn't always possible
I've been gluten-free for a number of years because of a wheat intolerance.
However, on the GR5, it became increasingly difficult to find suitable food options consistently. About halfway through the hike, I started eating gluten again because I needed food and sometimes there simply weren't other practical options available.
When you're covering long distances every day, getting enough food becomes a priority. It wasn't an ideal situation, but it was one of the compromises I made to keep going.
Where did I find the challenge?
The GR5 takes you through a huge variety of terrain.
There was concrete, road walking, forest trails, mountain tracks, slate, rocks of all shapes and sizes, and eventually the incredible mountain scenery of the French Alps.
The early stages were particularly challenging in the heat. There was also a lot of hard-surface walking, which I knew to expect before starting.
I wouldn't say the GR5 is an inherently difficult trail in the sense that every section is technically challenging. Much of it is very walkable.
However, the difficulty depends on how you approach it.
If you have plenty of time, you can break the route into manageable distances, take on one big climb a day and enjoy the experience at your own pace.
If you want a physical challenge, you can push the daily distances, increase your pace and put yourself under more pressure.
That's what I chose to do.
Hiking the route in 70 days meant maintaining a demanding daily routine, managing fatigue and continuing even when I wasn't feeling particularly enthusiastic about getting out of my sleeping bag.
The trail can be adapted to suit different abilities and ambitions, but the mountains still demand respect, particularly when weather conditions change.
How much did I enjoy the GR5?
I rated each day on a scale of 1 to 10 for enjoyment, fatigue and how easy I found the terrain.
Here's how the scores worked out across the 70 days.
Enjoyment: 575/700 — 82%
My average enjoyment score was 8.2 out of 10.
That's a pretty good result for 70 consecutive days of hiking!
The weather had a huge influence on my enjoyment, and I was incredibly lucky. Particularly in September, when I was travelling through the mountains, the conditions were phenomenal.
Blue skies, sunshine, beautiful views and long days spent outside made a massive difference.
Fatigue: 235/700 — 34%
My average fatigue score was 3.4 out of 10.
This is my subjective rating of how fatigued I felt each day, rather than a measurement of physical effort. There were plenty of demanding days, but I didn't feel completely exhausted all the time.
Ease of terrain: 241/700 — 34%
My average ease-of-terrain score was also 3.4 out of 10.
This reflects how easy I found the terrain, with lower scores indicating that I generally didn't find the terrain particularly easy.
These scores are personal assessments rather than scientific measurements, but they're a useful way of looking back at the experience.
The day I felt horrendous
I only had one really bad day: Day 49.
I felt absolutely horrendous, and I rated the experience a 9 out of 10 for difficulty.
There were plenty of possible explanations. The heat, dehydration, electrolytes, food, tiredness, altitude and accumulated fatigue could all have played a part.
I couldn't identify one definite cause.
What I do know is that I ate, slept and felt much better the following day.
It was a reminder that when you're undertaking a long-distance challenge, you won't feel great every day. Sometimes you have to make sensible decisions, look after yourself and see how you feel after some rest.
The second half was the best half
I always expected the second half of the GR5 to be the better half, and that's exactly how it turned out.
Reaching Switzerland and then crossing back into France, with the mountains becoming such a huge part of the experience, was incredible.
I had several days when my enjoyment scores were 9s and 10s. There were also a couple of 5s when things didn't go to plan, whether that was because of food availability or the weather.
The first half wasn't miserable. There were plenty of enjoyable days, lots of 7s and some lovely moments.
But I wouldn't rush to repeat the flatter sections.
I proved to myself that I could cover those long distances on concrete and roads when necessary. I just don't particularly enjoy it, and I now know that about myself.
The French Alps, on the other hand? I'd happily return.
I'd love to hike the Tour du Mont Blanc at some point in the future.
The highlights
There were so many things I loved about this adventure.
The mountains: The scenery in the Alps was phenomenal.
The views: Those moments when you reach a high point and can see the landscape stretching out in front of you.
The alpine lakes: Beautiful places to stop, take it all in and appreciate where you are.
The cols: All those mountain passes and the feeling of working your way through the landscape.
The wildlife: Another reminder of how much there is to see when you spend so much time outside.
The weather: I was incredibly lucky, especially in September.
Wild camping: Being able to spend so many nights in my tent was a real highlight.
The support: The comments and messages on Instagram and Facebook meant a lot to me.
I really enjoyed sharing the journey online and reading people's comments along the way. When you're out there day after day, it can be lovely to feel that people are following along and supporting what you're doing.
Thank you to everyone who followed the GR5, sent messages, left comments and took an interest in the adventure. I really appreciated it.
A few practical questions
Which tent did I use?
This was the question I was asked most frequently on Facebook!
I used the Terra Nova Laser Compact 2-person tent.
Was the GR5 hard?
This might sound strange after 70 days, 2,141km and almost 67,000m of ascent, but I wouldn't describe the GR5 as an inherently difficult trail.
It is a very walkable route, and you can adapt the challenge to suit your own goals, fitness and available time.
You don't have to cover huge distances or tackle multiple big climbs every day. If you want to take your time, you can.
Equally, if you want a demanding physical challenge, you can set ambitious daily targets and push yourself.
My experience was shaped by the pace I chose, not just the route itself.
Would I recommend wild camping?
Wild camping made a huge difference to my experience and my budget.
I loved the freedom of being able to spend so many nights in my tent, and it meant I wasn't tied to accommodation bookings every evening.
However, you need to research the rules and restrictions along the route, be respectful of landowners and the environment, and make sensible decisions about weather, water and where you pitch.
I was delighted with how much camping I managed to do.
Would I do it again?
I'd happily return to the French Alps. The mountains were a definite highlight, and I already know I'd like to hike the Tour du Mont Blanc in the future.
The flatter sections? I'll leave those for now!
I'm glad I did them, though. I learned a lot about myself and what I'm prepared to put up with when I have a goal to achieve.
The Fastest Known Time submission
One of my goals was to complete the GR5 within 70 days while aiming for the first women's FKT.
I've now submitted my tracking data and supporting information to the FKT team, and I'm waiting for their response.
The route data has to be reviewed, so I won't make any claims about the official outcome until that process is complete.
For me, the challenge was always about showing up, putting in the work and seeing what I could achieve.
And I made it to Nice.
What's next?
I've filmed the experience, and the GR5 vlogs will be coming to the Tough Girl YouTube channel soon!
I'm looking forward to sharing more of the journey, the daily realities, the places I stayed, the challenges and the moments that made this adventure so special.
If you're considering hiking the GR5 yourself, I hope these stats and reflections have been useful. The numbers tell one part of the story, but there's so much more to a long-distance hike than kilometres and elevation gain.
It's about the places you see, the decisions you make, the days that don't go to plan and the satisfaction of continuing to put one foot in front of the other.
2,141km. 70 days. Zero rest days. And a whole lot of memories.
Thank you for following along!
Over to you
Have you hiked the GR5, or is it on your adventure wish list?
Do you have any questions about the route, the costs, wild camping, my kit or what it was like to hike it in 70 days?
Leave a comment below. I'd love to hear from you!
Please note: I've done my best to make the statistics and costs as accurate as possible using my records, but there may be some small discrepancies in the figures.
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