My France Walk on the GR65 - May 2009

June 4, 2009

Hi All --

Just back on Tuesday from my 9 day solo ramble on a section of the GR65 trail aka Le Chemin de St. Jacques in south-west France. wow fantastic.

I wanted bucolic, rolling countryside dotted with medievil towns and easy access to comfortable nightly accommodation and food. Bingo! I got it in spades...

Started May 22 in Figeac on the River Lot and ended just outside Montcuq on May 29 some 120 klms down the road. I walked slow and steady with an average of about 15klm per day -- most other "pèlerins" (pilgrims) seemed to be doing 20 to 35 klms a day.

The walk was intended to be 10 days but the lack of bus service on Sundays and holidays in the region meant I had to return to Cahors early and spend the weekend there. Not a bad spot to spend a couple of sunny days and I did a day hike (about 10klm there and back) down the river on another section of the GR65 system.

Here's a map which includes the trail section (Figeac-Cahors) that I was walking on:

http://www.gr-infos.com/gr65f.htm

I decided to write this blog after having difficulty finding photos of the terrain and of the actual paths.  I really wanted to be able to see what I would be up against and was looking for a "beginners" easy trail.  Alors -- there are alot of trail photos here for your reference.

SOME OTHER LINKS:

Will generate distance and altitude excel sheets for your walk:

http://www.godesalco.com/plan

Pages from the Miam Miam Dodo -- the ESSENTIAL guidebook for the trail with simple maps and, most importantly, listings of all the B&Bs, hostels, publicly available taps of potable water, etc along the trail. In Paris buy the book at "Au Vieux Campeur," a giant store dedicated to all things outdoors:

http://www.chemindecompostelle.com/Selection/CartePuy09.html

A list of the baggage transfer services all along the French and Spanish pilgrim trail. The relevant one for the section I did was Taxi Bernard. Call the night before, leave the money in the backpack pocket, and for 8 Euros (flat rate) it will be dropped at your next night's accommodation.

http://www.chemindecompostelle.com/Selection/Transfert.html

Some info on all the main walking trails in France in english:

http://about-france.com/tourism/long-distance-footpaths.htm

Site of the La Fédération Francaise de la Randonnée Pédestre, all in french but pretty easy to get around if you can remember un petit peu of that highschool stuff. They publish great booklets with altitude maps and tourist site information on each and every national walking trail in France.  They are quite heavy though so, although I read them in the weeks before, I opted not to carry it with me in the interest of keeping my pack weight down. About $30 CDN for each publication if I remember right. http://www.ffrandonnee.fr/Default.aspx

Postscript 2013: I'm adding this link which is a list of (mostly) commonsense advice for solo hikers -- it's amazing how often we forget this type of thing, yes? 
http://solofriendly.com/10-tips-for-hiking-alone-safely