Beginning in 4 days

I would definitely book San Sebastián ahead of time! They don't have much in terms of albergues, but some regular hostels as well as hotels and Airbnb.

San Sebastián there was room, but 24 euros is minimum. Zaurautz was expensive and didn’t have many options, so many went on to Getaria and there was room there at the pilgrims hostel which was more affordable. We have not booked ahead so far, but I don’t know about further on yet!

synvilla said:

I would definitely book San Sebastián ahead of time! They don't have much in terms of albergues, but some regular hostels as well as hotels and Airbnb.

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Good advice and this time of year the Norte will be more in terms of sleeping. Many public albergues will be crowded with surfers and students.

meeemsd said:

Hello! I have just arrived in SJPP from Lourdes having walked the GR78. I will take the Irun link to begin my del Norte route. Is anyone currently on del Norte? Do I need to reserve ahead?

Thank you!

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Hello! We are 5 days in and have had some issues - some were because we started late or underestimated how hard and how long a stage would take. In Guernica we couldn’t get anything. All hotels were booked. We took a bus to Bilbao. The first few days we booked day before or in morning the other days (San Sebastián). We want to stay in the municipal albergues so haven’t booked when we think we have a chance, but I now think I have to plan better (I never planned on the Frances).

Some things to note: The hospitelera at Deba, Oni, was super lovely and welcoming. There were only 2 working showers for +56 pilgrims and she had to send pilgrims to other places in the early evening.
We took the high level route from
Irún to San Sebastián and should not have because it was so cloudy that we couldn’t see any views. It was as hard as everyone says - check weather first! If you do take it there’s a point where, after climbing for awhile, there’s a gate or two paths to the left that take you further into woods - go through the gate. We didn’t see any marking there and thought it was private so kept going into the woods until we realised it couldn’t be right and backtracked. I’ll try to update here if we have any issues going forward.
Buen camino