Over Easter, I started an adventure with my son Christopher - to walk the GR11. The GR11 is an 860 km trail that runs the length of the Pyrenees from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean (or in reverse).
The complete route takes around 45 days, so we are walking it in sections over several years. This trip took in a 4 day, 60 km section from Cap de Higer on the Atlantic coast to Elizondo in the Baztan area of the Pyrenees.
Despite not the best weather, we had a great time. Christopher's energy levels as a 12 year old are incredible and he was lively as anything at the end of the long days while I had aching legs and was longing to reach our hotel!
Day 1 - Cabo de Higer to Irun (8.6 km, 137 metres ascent)
In the morning we drove over to the Basque Country to Cabo de Higer on the Atlantic coast - the official start of the GR11. We didn't start hiking until almost three o'clock so we did a short day just to the town of Irun. The first few kilometres were on a lovely coastal path and then we headed through the beautiful town of Hondarribia - one of the prettiest in the area.
We stopped to dip our hands in the water (too cold to swim!) and to have a tapa and an ice-cream in Hondarribia (never too cold for ice-cream!) before continuing on to Irun. This section is known as the prologue as it's mainly through the town.
Phil and Christopher at Cabo de Higer - the start of the GR11
Ice-creams in Hondarribia
Day 2 - Irun to Bera de Bidasoa (24.5 km, 974 metres ascent)
Today we started for real! A long stage leaving the towns behind and entering the lovely Basque countryside. The Basque Country is known for its rolling green hills - for me it has quite an English feel about it.
Our route passed by beautiful farmhouses, and the rolling hills got craggier as we continued. There were two main climbs each of about 400 metres, but nothing too steep. At each col, the coast looked further away and by lunchtime we could no longer see the sea.
The last descent was quite steep and long - we could see the village of Bera beneath us but it didn't seem to getting any closer! We managed nearly 25km with a lot of ascent in just over 8 hours which was good going for a twelve year old! In Bera we stayed at the lovely Hotel Charrut which had a fantastic restaurant which was lucky as we were both really hungry!
Day 3 - Bera to Col de Lizarrieto (9.4 km, 578 metres ascent)
The forecast hadn't been good for any of this trip but so far we'd been lucky and stayed dry. Today our luck run out and after a couple of hours we were walking in thick mist and a drizzle that was getting heavier every ten minutes.
The full length of this stage was over 30 km with 1300 metres ascent, so the idea was always to cut this stage in two. In the end, with the weather we bailed out as early as we could at a placed called Col de Lizarrieto on the French/Spanish border.
On the way we passed by some great Linea P bunkers. These were built by Franco in the late 40's/early 50's to defend against an allied invasion over the Pyrenees to put him out of power. There are over 8000 bunkers across the length of the Pyrenees and the Baztan area has a huge number as the mountains are at their lowest here and it's a relatively easy crossing point.
On the map, there were a couple of cafe's marked and we were looking forward to a coffee and a hot chocolate while waiting for Anna to come and pick us up but when we arrived they were both closed -a big disappointment!
A Linea P bunker
Day 4 - Col de Lizarrieto to Elizondo (22.7 km, 863 metres ascent)
Anna drove us back up to Lizarrieto in the morning to start hiking where we left off the day before. Another long day of over 20 kilometres that Christopher took in his stride.
The GR11 follows the French border for a while, and every ridge in the area was full of hunting spots. They looked like grouse butts lined along the highest ridges, but are actually for hunting pigeons which is apparently popular in the area.
The route passed through some nice countryside but there had been a lot of logging going on and the tracks we were following had been turned into thick mud by the machinery which made walking a bit awkward in places.
We had fantastic luck at one small copse of trees. We had left the path slightly to investigate a bunker when we heard a woodpecker loudly drumming above us. With the trees not having any leaves yet, we managed to spot the woodpecker and identified it as a greater spotted. We watched it for about ten minutes drumming away looking for insects. Christopher was thrilled - it was the first time he's seen a woodpecker and it was a great sighting.
In the afternoon the path got a lot better and we made quite quick progress up the last climb and then began the long descent down into Elizondo.
Christopher really wanted to keep to an average speed of 3km an hour and we were a few minutes off the pace so he made me jog the last two kilometres to make up time!
And that was it for this section of the GR11.We had hoped to hike one day more but the weather the following day was awful so we called it off and played board games instead. I didn't want to have a horrid day in the rain and put Chrsitopher off from wanting to do the rest of the route.
That's the first 60 km hiked, just 800 more to do! Christopher did brilliantly and I was really proud of him. We're hoping to get away again in May to walk another few days of the route, this is going to be a long term project!
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