Long trip for small reward?

Agreeing with the suggestion of @ChrisSunami that the "connotation of taking a trip for the trip's sake" is not necessarily a negative one, I would offer a quote attributed to T.S. Eliot:

“The journey, not the arrival matters,”

which seems to capture this positive notion as does the following idiom:

Getting there is half the fun.

Tripping over dollars to pick up pennies communicates the idea of wasting resources for small rewards.

Of course in America they said "I'd walk a mile for a Camel. That's actually a long trip to kill yourself ;-)

Much ado about nothing?

-W. Shakespeare