Friday, February 28, 2025

Feb 28 - all great, except one abandoned trail

More perfect weather. Through San Sebastián along the waterfront was fun. 2 good bakery stops. A super convenient electronics shop to replace a non-functional plug adapter. All good trails, except…

We planned about 8 miles along the coastal on what we thought was the GR 121. It still had some old tags, but no signposts, which GRs always have. We followed it for several miles, although it was not well used and had a bit of encroaching vegetation, it was still easy to follow. Then at some point it disappeared, and we thrashed through gorse and blackberry for 45 minutes to relocate it; then another 45 minutes following severely overgrown tread until we emerged at a house. The fellow at the house said that beyond him the track had collapsed into the sea; people stopped using it, and then maintenance had stopped. The GR121 has been abandoned in this stretched. So we redirected onto the Camino del Norte, which ran just a couple hundred meters from the house.

We are disappointed, but we'll see what tomorrow brings.

We are happy and healthy, but pretty scratched up from the gorse and blackberries.

Feb 24-27 - travel to Spain and start walking.

SFO to Paris/Orly. Bus to Airbnb. Sleep. Walk to
Montparnas station. Train to Hendaye, and at noon on 26th we start walking west on the north coast of Spain. If all goes according to plan we'll arrive in Ferrol in about 8 weeks.

Great weather. Hard hiking with lots steep of up and down on very rocky trails. Good campsites on 26th and again now, evening of 27th.

We are happy and healthy with tired legs. 43.33504, -1.92378