I have to say I disagree. I took up hillwalking a couple of years ago, partly to improve my health and fitness. I joined walking groups on Meetup, but at the time I was too unfit to join many of the hillwalks being organised, so to cut a long story short, I began organising my own hillwalks, smaller hills that I was fit enough to climb.
After a while I decided to launch my own walking and hillwalking group on Meetup. I decided to keep it free, because I have no qualifications as a walk leader - though I've learned a lot over time and I think I'm pretty good at it now! I know this because people often tell me how often they love my walks, and when I asked for small donations to pay for the group fees I received more than enough.
I have another two organisers for my group, and none of us get paid. We do it because we love it. I have made fantastic friends through doing this, my fitness levels have rocketed and I've learned loads of new skills, like climbing and bouldering, because others have been keen to share their skills with me too, all free of charge.
I think if I started to charge for these walks people's expectations would rise and it wouldn't be so much fun.
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