Where to start?

[daydreamer76]

Hopefully, this question hasn't been already asked an answered. I have done a fair amount of searching on the forum, and it has been extremely helpful so far.

To explain myself, I will be traveling alone (20s female), and hope to leave late May early June 2011, in hopes to reach Santiago in late July. While I speak Spanish, my french is practically nonexistent. I am walking in between my current job and entering graduate school, so this is my time for the foreseeable future. I know I will have to keep somewhat to a schedule, because my parents will be joining me in Leon and walk with me to the finish.

The question I have is this, I have about 60 (more or less) days to walk the Camino, and am having difficulty finding a good place to start. I know I won't have time to start in Le Puy, no matter how much I want to. I would like to start a little further from STJPP, in hopes to experience the french part of the camino. Is there a place that would be ideal to start in the middle of the Le Puy route? Or, should I accept my limitations and simply start from the more popular starting points?

Also, is there any particular town that is easier for first-time pilgrims to start on in terms of access and transportation?

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

 

[sillydoll]

Ooohhh!! You are going to get so many suggestions you'll be spoiled for choice!

I have an idea for you! If you want to walk from St Jean on the Camino Frances, but would also like to walk in France, how about starting at Lourdes (on the Arles route) and walking to Somport then onto the Aragones route which joines the Camino Frances at Eunate? You could walk to Pamplona, get a taxi to St Jean and start the Camino Frances from there! 14 - 16 days walking on the Arles/Aragones a rest day in St Jean and then 5 weeks on the Frances, continuing to Finisterre at the end.

 

[Anna-Marie]

Hi daydreamer,

How far you can walk overall really depends on how far you want to walk in a day. I did the route from Le Puy in 2.5 months--but a lot of people did it much faster. I was 28, but not in great shape (to begin with), and had a lot of time, so I didn't push it.

A lot of French people were walking the Chemin from Le Puy in Stages. After Le Puy, Conques and Moissac seemed to be the major starting places, so I'd imagine they're very accessible. A lot of the other main-ish towns should have good transportation as well.

If you start in Conques, you miss about the first 10 days of the walk from Le Puy--so it should actually be pretty do-able, even if you're almost as slow as I was. Conques is a beautiful little town in a valley--very touristy but gorgeous and historic, with lots of artists and artisans, and beautiful little shops and a cathedral with rather odd "Zen" stained glass and a bunch of gites d'etape (hostels for walkers). The downside to starting there is the horrendous ascent out of the valley. But by starting in Conques you do miss a number of the knee-breaking parts of the Chemin du Puy, while still getting some of the stunning views.

Moissac was also nice. It's about two weeks away from SJPP. It gets relatively flat around there, so the walking is easier but the scenery isn't as wonderful until the Pyrenees foothills. Although if you go at the right time, you'll see oceans of sunflowers (I was there in late September/early October and they were mostly dying or harvested).

But really, I'd think it would be easy to start in any of the big-ish towns if you wanted to (like the places that say "all services"--except in French--in the indispensable Miam Miam Dodo guidebook, which is French but has easy-to-understand symbols). I think Alison Raju has a new edition of her guidebook (it's in English!) out this year, too.

It's definitely worth starting in France, though, for a different Camino experience from Spain. One of my favourite parts of my trip was walking up to the Pyrenees and knowing I was going to walk over them (if you're interested, you can see a few of my Pyrenees-in-the-distance photos here).

The Le Puy route with no French is more difficult than the Camino Frances with no Spanish--it's definitely possible (I met several people who didn't speak much French at all) but harder and more lonely. I spoke enough French to ask for directions and carry out basic conversations, but it was sometimes frustrating because I knew people were having interesting discussions around me, but they were speaking too quickly for me to understand. There's always the occasional Swiss or German who speaks good English, though, and the very occasional native English-speaker. It might be different in spring, though--I was there in fall, when a lot of my fellow walkers were French retirees.

I hope this helps!

Anna-Marie

 

[bjorgts]

I started a little bit up in France in 2007, and I just found a place where good communications cross the camino. I used 5 1/2 week to Santiago and started in a very small village called Argagnon, a days walk before Navarrenx. I was 55 years old and I am not a "long-distance-runner"! You can start further up in France. My advice is: Find out around how fare up in France you can start, and then look for a good - or possible - way to get to a starting-point in that region.

Congues is a very nice place to start, for example, but to get there... There is one bus a day, leaving Rodez in the afternoon. Now the time is 16.20, I think, but the bus is not going on Saturdays and Sundays. We started in Conques this summer - on a Sunday. We knew there was no bus, but wanted to start where we ended our walk last year. The taxi on a Sunday costed 70€. This is just an example. In Spain there are a lot of busses going all over the country, in France not. Figeac, Cahors and Moissac are places with train-connection to Paris, for example. We went from Cahors to Paris this summer.

You can look here for more details about busses in Midi-Pyrenees: http://midipyrenees.angloinfo.com/infor ... busses.asp
And here you can surch for trains: http://www.voyages-sncf.com/billet-train

We have been walking in France the last three years in the second half of June. I think you will meet quite many people having english as there first foreign language, Swiss an Germany, yes, but do not forget people from the Netherlands and the Nordic countries. As you can see from this post, their english are not perfect, but good enough for conversation... Bjørg

 

[robertt]

All good suggestions there.

If you started at Moissac, very practical option, you could stay at the Ultreia gite, whose Irish owners are renowned for their helpfulness to Anglophone pilgrims.

During a blog chat with Kiwinomad, it occurred to us that the Bearn country, which is a lovely, temperate region of green hills, might be a great start-out point, rather than confronting the Pyrenees immediately. Bjorgts has suggested Argagnon: could be a good tip.

I loved the Bearn, and one isn't far from the glorious Basque country and the odd Spanish speaker. Any problems with gear etc can be ascertained well before St Jean, where you have good equipment shops.

Something else about the Le Puy route: it occurred to me that I would be quite happy to see my nieces walking alone through that part of France. And I'm told that I'm a somewhat protective uncle!

 

[Kitsambler]

Moissac has really good rail connections; a 15-minute local hop and then the TGV to Paris. Or, you could fly into Toulouse and take train to Moissac from there. Gite Ultreia is a real treat.

I will be starting next year's walk at Cahors (where I ended this year), which is larger than Moissac and has some very interesting old town buildings including the cathedral. It's about 4 days' walk "upstream" from Moissac.

 

[McAleerSherry]

You might not rule out making it from LePuy to Santiagon the 60 days. We did it in 61 days from April 25 to June 25 2008, with two days off. As many people here have mentioned, it is all a matter of how far you can walk at your own pace, or if you might suffer an unexpected injury or blisters, for instance.

In that case, several people whom we travelled with ended up taking a bus, taxi, or train to make up distance if unable to walke one or more etapes without getting behind schedule. Others take public transportation to skip less desiarable portions (such as the meseta between Burgos and Leon in Spain, although we found that portion particulary enjoyable). Such an approach has been called a "designer camino," but is a good option if you want to enjoy parts of the journey at different points.

LePuy is a good sart point for getting a creanciale, a blessing, and perhaps carryiong an intention. Recommend that you look also at Margaret Riordan's blog from the time we also traveled, as we as several of the blogs that her site mentions, for good tips and high points of each etape.

Good luck and we envy you your pilgrimage.

 

[daydreamer76]

Thank you all so much for your insight!

I have wondered about walking more than the usual amount. I am a pretty active person, and don't expect this to be an extremely physical challenge for me, but was hesitant to plan to walk more. I also don't want to rush my way through this. It sounds as if some people are able to walk more that the usual amount.

robertt, thank you for the reassurance about the security of the Le Puy route. My friends are quite worried about me making this trek alone. (I tend to be a little clumsy) My goal is do this as "low tech" as possible. Mostly for the challenge to see if I, as a child of the digital age, can make it 60 days without my beloved laptop/ipod/cell phone.

 

[ranthr]

Hello daydreamer.
I like your idea of being 60 days without laptops and so on, but I would advise you to bring a cell phone on the Le Puy route. You will need it to call ahead for a place to sleep. There are not tourist offices in all the small places along the route. I went from Le Puy to Santiago last summer/autumn and used 65 days with some very short days in France instead of restdays. Had a long walk into Burgos and took two nights there, so I had a restday there. I am 62 and surely less fit than you are. I also carried a heavy backpack because I always have to bring with me some food and enough water.
About the GR65 in France I would advise you to start in Le Puy. The part of the route from Le Puy up to as far as Cahors or even Moissac is in my opinion the most interesting and the most beautiful. The last part was more boring, little to see and a lot of walking on road with cornacres on both sides. If you start in Le Puy and find out that you are short of days, you could rather take a bus or train a bit of this part.
I would not advise you to skip the meseta from Burgos. When you have been walking the ups and downs on the GR65, where you have often to take care of where you put down your feet, it is heaven to walk the long stretches on the meseta where you can let your thoughts fly everywhere else than caring about the path. If you need to cut out some bits in Spain there are lots of buses on the asfaltroads into Burgos and Leon.
Good luck in your planning.
Randi

 

[Anna-Marie]

Hi daydreamer,

I did the trip alone (though I did walk with people I met intermittently), as a 28-year-old woman. I never once felt even the tiniest bit worried about my safety on the Le Puy route--except maybe a bit while walking on some of the highways.

A cell phone would be handy. I managed without one--partly by making friends with other walkers who did have cell phones, I have to admit. My French is adequate but not great, and it's harder to communicate on telephones, but I often found another walker who was making their own reservation and didn't mind adding me in. Also, the private gite owners were generally quite helpful about calling ahead to the next gite for me. When I had to, I called from a phone booth.

Where a cell phone would've come in really handy was when I couldn't get hold of the gite I was trying to book, so had to leave a message and hope for the best.

If you're willing to skip walking a bit of the Camino if necessary to keep to your schedule and don't mind some serious steepness, I'd second ranthr's suggestion to start in Le Puy. I also found it more beautiful than most of the post-Moissac section, up to the Pyrenee foothills, which you really shouldn't skip. Le Puy is also a beautiful town in itself, and there's a pilgrim's blessing--usually by the bishop--to start you off, if you're interested in that (they also hand out pilgrim credentials--by donation, I think).

Have fun planning!
Anna-Marie