We all walk at a different natural pace, so do you focus on the amount of time you are going to be out walking and aim for a certain number of hours, or do you plan with a specific distance in mind and look to complete it regardless of how long it takes?
Both, and factor in the weather, daylight hours, the conditions underfoot etc. e.g. : - walking from home (which is mainly across fields and through woods) - I generally plan on half a day, as the scenery isn't that fascinating. Then I plan a route that will take me around half a day. - a day in the Lakes/Snowdonia in summer - pick a summit or ridge I haven't done for a while, work out a nice circular route, measure the length and see if this sounds feasible given my current hill fitness (for example, I could do 20 miles over the hills, but I'd be getting down in the dark, and the last 5 or more miles would not be fun). - a day in the hills in winter - check timing so that the only bit (if any) to be done in the dark is easier ground at lowish level/track/road walking, or is on a route I know well
Time. At some point I started to be able to look at a walk and know how long it would take me. Until very recently when I got a GPS watch, I only had a rough idea of distance, so I would normally plan a walk based around travel time to and from my start point as most of my walks are day walks. So 5 to 7hrs which turns out to be around 10 miles, leaving enough time to go to the pub after (for a meal of course).
I tend to look at a map and pick what looks like an interesting route and guesstimate that I will acheive it in daylight/ a given time. At the start of the 'season' this can lead to some later finnishes as i tend not to compensate for fitness or increase in age.
When I used to walk in New Zealand the signs always had either distance or time on them but rarely both - if they had both then it would have been an indication of how hard the terrain was going to be. This year I'm trying to do the #walk1000miles thing so distance is the focus....
This year I'll be lucky to get 1500 miles on the bike, and racking up cycling miles is far easier than walking miles!
