Day 33 Sarrance to Urdos, 27 km

Gronze writers call this an easy day. Good grief. But they stop before Urdos and they don’t take into account a change in the GR that adds about 2 km. I found it tough. There were some ups and downs, but the main issue is that you have to concentrate like crazy for a lot of the day. The morning started with more narrow paths with big drops down to the river. And it rained yesterday so they were a bit damp. Not too bad, but wet enough to need to pay a bit more attention. At one point there were cables to hold on to - I assume they were put there mostly to help if it were raining. Cables or not, it was better than yesterday. But still not my favourite. Then 5 or 6 easy kilometers to the village of Bedous. Home of many many raptors with V-shaped tails. tails. I’m not sure what they are. And mountains in all the directions. Some paragliders. But no place to sit down and have a coffee. So I walked to the next place, Acous, which did. And then the chemin went onto the big main road. There was a shoulder. But a European shoulder. There was room but that took a lot of attention. And it went on like that for the rest of the day. Big road, narrow and slightly scary path up high over the river. It’s tiring!

About ten days ago it was not possible to walk the whole path I went on today. People had to take the bus because of damage done by flooding. But as of a short while ago that damage has been fixed. There were maybe 4 places where they basically made new trail — above an old one that was destroyed or where the old one had been. What a job. I also think they replaced a bridge. Very happy to have missed the bus!

And then finally I was in Borce (end of the Gronze etape) - about an hour later than I would have thought. Very beautiful small chapel there that has been done over to tell the history of the Camino. I did not have the energy to read the panels but I did sit down there to eat my lunch. By this point it was raining.

I had been expecting another 3 or 4 kilometers. But in the end I think it was probably 6. Another of the changes to this route involved making a foot bridge that would allow people to stay on a route away from the big road. The bridge is very cool but the new route adds at least two more kilometres. The new route is also not on Gronze or Mapy and was not part of the track I downloaded. I did find it on buen camino app. But before that there was a lot of humming and ha-ing. I knew about the bridge because I had read about it. So I was willing but not completely sure to follow the GR markings that disagreed with most of the maps. And that were also guiding the GR10! I did not want to end up on it and up high somewhere by mistake.

The bridge is beautiful- part of a set of walkways around an old prison built high in the rock. Fort Portalet. It was about 1.5 kilometers from Urdos where I am now. Nice gite that I am sharing with three people from Czech Republic who asked me to eat the rest of their most excellent pasta lunch. The woman forages as she walks!

Tomorrow we will all get up early and walk up to Somport. So I had better go to sleep!Read more