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| MY TRAIN TO LOURDES |
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I'M HERE
 | | SANCTUARY |
|
 | | SUBTERRANEAN BASILICA ST. PI X |
|
|
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| LAC (NOT SO) GLORIETTES |
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| ALONG THE ESTAUBE VALLEY |
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| START OF CLIMB TO TUCA ROYA |
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| GETTING COLD AND ICY |
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| TUCA ROYA REFUGE |
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| SLEEPING QUARTERS |
After
a very smooth train journey from Toulouse, courtesy of SNCF, I alighted at
Lourdes shortly after 1.00pm. I would be staying at the Hotel du Commerce et de
Navarre overnight, and the plan was to catch a bus to Gèdre in the morning. My
first stop then was the Office de Tourisme de Lourdes so that I could check the
bus times and pick-up location.
After that, I offloaded my heavy rucksack and swopped my boots for Crocs at the
hotel, then took a walk to The Sanctuaire Notre-Dame de Lourdes. To see this,
and especially to visit Sainte Bernadette's Grotto set into the side of the
church, is why most people come to Lourdes. I came here before on my first
Pyrenees adventure in 2014. To be honest, the place is like a huge religious
theme park, but at least it's all free, including the holy water. The local
traders make a killing though by selling pretty bottles for the water, statues
of Holy Mary in various sizes, and lots of other religious souvenirs.
It started to drizzle by early evening, and I quickly discovered how slippery
Crocs can be on wet pavement. I ducked into a cafe for a croque monsieur, ice
cream and coffee. I wasn't that hungry, so I decided that this would serve as
my evening meal. The rain having ceased, I headed back to the hotel, picking up
some items for breakfast from the local Carrefour supermarket along the way.
The following morning it was raining, and the mist was so thick that I couldn't
see the hills nearby. Having studied the weather forecast the previous evening,
this was no surprise, and the weather would be no better at Gèdre. The first
few days of my walk will be difficult, so it was important for me to be walking
and climbing on dry rock. Besides, what is the point of walking in the Pyrenees
if you can't see the views? Having spoken with the Hotel owner the previous
night, he was happy for me to stay a second night at a price even cheaper than
first.
I spent half the day reading the 'i' newspaper that I had brought with me from cover
to cover, and doing all the puzzles. The rest of the day involved a repeat
visit to the religious sights in my waterproofs, this time without the previous
day's crowds. Lunch was the 'plat de jour' at a local restaurant, and my
evening meal was French onion soup followed by a tot of limoncello.
And so, after a restful night, I caught the 965 bus to Gèdre, the hour-long
journey getting me there at about 10.30 am and costing a mere 2 euros. From Gèdre, the walking began by climbing 600m of zig-zag path through the Bois de
Coumely. The route then continued south-east with a much gentler slope until it
reached Lac Gloriettes, a point of contact with my previous 2018 walk. The lake was at a low level, and looked dirty and unattractive in contrast to previous visit. Previously, I had continued east to Heas, but this time, I determined to head south so that I could cross into Spain via the Breche de Tuquerouye (or Forqueta de Tuca Roya in the
Spanish maps). As before, I could see that there was snow on the steep slope,
but hoped I could get around it.
After a slightly chilly picnic lunch by Lac Gloriettes, I followed the Gave d'Estaube upstream
until I could see the Cabane d'Estaube on the far bank. My route then started
to ascend steadily until I reached a rock called the Borne de Tuque Rouye which
marks where the climb up to the Breche starts, and it certainly did appear that
I could avoid the snow. It was at this point that I suddenly developed leg
cramps, and wished I had put lots of salt on my previous night's meal. I did
wonder if this was a bit of a warning but, when the cramps subsided, I decided
to proceed. The linear distance to the top was less than half a kilometre and I
had two and a half hours of daylight left, seemingly plenty of time.
As expected, the route became steeper as I climbed, and it became increasingly
difficult to walk on the scree as it just slid away underfoot. I had to aim for
the rocks to get a reliable footing, but some of those were quite large, with
serious consequences if I got it wrong whilst climbing over them. Progress
was extremely slow, or should I say, painfully slow, because it was about half
way up that the leg cramps started again. I perched myself on a rock for a
while until the pain seemed to subside, but the moment I used either leg to step
up, the cramps started again. Further climbing was going to hurt me a lot.
Then, just to complicate matters, I noticed that some of the rocks were glazed
with ice.
It was at this point that I wondered if I should go down again, but the descent
looked even more scary and dangerous than the ascent. Fortunately, I had
brought some crampons with me, so, from my safe perch, I put them on. In the
process, the dry-bag containing my torches fell out of my rucksack, luckily
catching on a rock just a couple of metres down. Given that this was all taking
longer than expected, and I now had less than an hour of daylight left, I
definitely couldn't afford to lose the torches. Fortunately, with the crampons
on, they were easy to retrieve.
Indeed, the crampons gave me a much more reliable grip on the icy rocks, and as
I continued to climb, I even found that the scree could be walked on again
because all the small pieces of rock were frozen together into a solid mass.
I was pretty exhausted by now but kept on climbing, just one carefully-placed,
painful, step at a time. Suddenly, I could see the refuge at the top silhouetted
against the fading glow of the sky as night approached. I kept moving, and
gradually the silhouette got bigger and bigger until I was there, sitting on
the French side of the hut. I could see vague shadows of people moving about on
the platform to the side of the refuge, and could hear their Spanish
conversation. I called out 'hola', and a hand came down and helped me
take that final step onto the platform.
There was a good half dozen people already at the refuge and they had all arrived
from the much easier and shorter Spanish side. It was quite dark now, which
added to the amazement they expressed when they saw me emerge from the French
side.
Whilst they may have been impressed, I felt that I had exceeded my risk
threshold and things could have gone horribly wrong. Fortunately, I kept a cool
head and had the right equipment, but I couldn't have foreseen leg cramps
slowing me down to such a degree.
Anyway, in the comfort of the refuge, I was shown which mattress would be mine
and invited the share some of the pasta dish which was being cooked. It was
cold inside the refuge, so the hot food was appreciated. Whilst I was finishing
my food, others were already cleaning their teeth. With no light other than
that produced by head torches, folk were getting ready to sleep. I followed
suit, and before long we were all bunched up like sardines on the sleeping platform.
Hardly the Ritz, but I was just grateful to be there.
