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Success Of Isle Of Wight Walking Festival Leads To Double Event In 2022

c Visit Isle of Wight & Leon Butler

This year's Isle of Wight Walking Festival has been hailed such a success, it's led to the extension of the popular event, over two separate dates in 2022 – spring and autumn.

This year’s Isle of Wight Walking Festival – organised by Visit Isle of Wight – saw over 1,600 people take part.

The shortest walk at 0.5 miles was the ‘Wessex Cancer Trust Starlit Trail’ at Ventnor Botanic Garden and the longest walk at 18.5 miles was from Kingston Smallholdings for the annual celebration of ‘Goat-ober’.

The combined distance of the festival's 100 walks reached 413 miles, criss-crossing the Island. Feedback from walkers has been overwhelmingly positive.

Created with the aim of extending the traditionally quieter ‘shoulder’ season, the Isle of Wight Walking Festival has proved a popular event. It was rescued in 2017 by Visit Isle of Wight, along with valuable support from local tourism businesses.

Organisers of the Isle of Wight Walking Festival said:

"We are very grateful to our walk leaders and volunteers who made this year’s Isle of Wight Walking Festival such a successful event, with amazing support from the local businesses. It was fantastic to see so many visitors and locals discovering the best of the Island on
foot."

Ian Griffiths, Chairman of Visit Isle of Wight, led 5 walks over this year’s Isle of Wight Walking Festival:

"It was a delight to curate and lead five walks for this year’s Isle of Wight Walking Festival, with walkers from both the island and the mainland joining me, we managed to all enjoy the stunning and often missed scenery the Isle of Wight has to offer."

Now Islanders are being asked to ‘save the date’, as Visit Isle of Wight will introduce two walking festivals in 2022.

The newly confirmed dates for 2022 will see the spring festival between 7-15 May and an autumn festival from 8-16 October, with more opportunities to discover the beautiful Isle of Wight at different times of nature’s calendar.

The spring Isle of Wight Walking Festival will this year include the popular fundraising event supporting the local hospice Mountbatten ‘Walk The Wight’ on May 8, which sees a variety of walks open to all including the 26.5 mile trek from one side of the Isle of Wight to the
other!

Nigel Hartley, Mountbatten CEO said:

"We are delighted to be working alongside Visit Isle of Wight to bring the Walking Festival and Walk the Wight together again.

"We know many visitors like to take part in our iconic walk and we know that as an Island, we rely so heavily on them choosing us as a
destination.

"It makes complete sense to offer lots of opportunities and hope they will come and explore, support our economy but also support our
Island hospice.

"After an incredibly difficult 18 months, we are really determined to get Walk the Wight back to its very best and this will certainly help us
do that."

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