Another travel day

One more day before I will finally start to walk. I don’t think I’ve ever taken this long to get to my starting point!

Today started with a bus ride to Jaca. Two more bus rides to get (FINALLY) to Urdos. I went to the tourist office to check up on the schedule for the second bus to France. She told me that I would have a two hour wait in Canfranc station and not get to France until after five. A friend from the forum had told me about a good Taxi, so I sent a WhatsApp and got a reasonable quote.

I have wanted to visit the Art Museum in the Cathedral since I last walked through Jaca and had found it closed for a holiday. Like the museum in Barcelona, it houses Romanesque frescoes from several rural churches. This involved the “strappo” technique— if I understood the information panels correctly, some kind of dampened linen was spread over the painting, and then somehow they lift it up, move it, and reapply it to the new wall. This sounds very complicated.

Even though I will be back here in a few days, I decided to seize the opportunity and visit the museum. There were some amazing frescoes One originally had four rows of paintings on the church walls, depicting the life of Christ in chronological order. There were also some beautiful Romanesque virgins with child.

I arrived in the small town of Urdos, which now has two closed hotels and one small open hotel. There is also a pilgrims’ Albergue, but I opted for the hotel. I did get my first stamp, and also met the man who runs the the pilgrims’ gite, along with the man who is taking it upon himself to remark the route after last year’s landslides. They tell me it is all walkable now, no need to take a detour on the extremely narrow road. For that, I am very grateful.

I am a bit nervous about tomorrow, to tell the truth. It probably wasn’t the best idea to have such a rough day on the first day of walking, but I really wanted to “cross the Pyrenees” (ok, I know that’s hyperbolic). The sign says it’s four hours 20 minutes and 12.5 km to the mountain pass at the border. What they don’t tell you is that it’s also 1000 m up! I doubt I will get there in four hours and 20 minutes, but I’m not in a rush. A Forum friend who just walked this route a few days ago told me that I would want to stop to take a picture every few steps anyway. Looks like good weather, fingers crossed.Meer informatie