My GR5 Adventure

Started 27th June 2018 - Finished... i'll let you know what I get there!

...what is the GR5 Trail?

The GR5 is a famous alpine trail from Lake Geneva to the Mediterranean, traditionally ending in Nice.

The route is around 620km.

None of the guide books or stories I had read could have made it sound more spectacular than it really is. All the hiking in the Pyrenees can not compare to the beauty of this walk.

Every day is different and each one a different challenge. Mostly I have been lucky with the weather but I have also had torrential rain and heavy mist. Mostly it's lovely and hot and sunny so it is best to get up early and be on the trail by 6 or 7 so most of the hard work is done before it's too hot. A very hot day can turn into a very cold night high up.

The meals in refuges are basic but good and Really expensive because of the difficulty of getting it up the mountain. The flowers are wonderfully diverse and such pretty colours. Eagles soar above and marmots bigger than cats chirp and scuttle about. The path necessarily is either going up or down and both are really strenuous, I can never decide which is worse, it always seems to be the one I am hiking!

Some days are high up in the snow and some in beautiful green valleys. Most are a mixture of the two with hard rocky ascents or descents in between. There are hundreds of enormous waterfalls everywhere as the snow melts. Usually one can see the trail for miles ahead. The sign posting always gives the distances in hours to walk and it's a challenge to keep to those times and usually I cant.

Yesterday was a real snowy walk with the trail going up and over snow a lot of the time, I had my crampons on and was the envy of other less well equipped hikers with the ease of my descent as I strode past!

All the people I meet are really friendly and helpful and most speak some English. The refuge hut guardians are very patient with my attempts at French! I often meet the same people several nights running and they feel almost like friends until they overtake me. I am not the only lone female hiker at all but the only UK one so far.

Often I am high in the mountains with very basic facilities, other times usually at lower elevations it is slightly more civilised. In popular locations there can be up to a hundred people staying in or near one hut and so 2 showers aren't really enough! I usually prefer my tent but sometimes I have stayed in the dormitory when it's been bad weather. A real treat is my own room in a gite.

One night the thunder and lighting were tremendous, I was fine in my tent but the next morning parts of the trail were a mass of mud rocks and broken trees where flash floods in the night had brought stuff down the mountain.I was up to my ankles in soft mud.

I am making slow but reasonable progress through France, I am very proud of myself and loving every minute ( well almost!)

26th July - I am now just about half way along the trail and starting my fifth week.

All the experiences and challenges I have had have amazed me and I'm sure will continue to do so. As I expected it has almost become a way of life and a continuous long-distance hike is so absorbing because it is such hard work. What is Wonderful is that every day is both similar and yet completely different. It's easy to think ' seen one view, seen them all' but here in amongst the Alps it is staggering how beautiful it all is.

The other amazing factor is how friendly everyone is. Hikers always seem to talk to each other and with my very rudimentary French I manage well as when I begin the other person almost always replies in English, whatever their nationality. It's important to smile and greet people on the trail as one may well be sharing a table or a dormitory at the next refuge!

I am now a very efficient camper as I camp often which requires lots of organization...I am brilliant!

Most days consist of a huge mountain to be climbed or descended depending on where I have spent the night. The trail is usually very steep, up or down and I don't like either but the reward of a col at the end of a grueling climb is So exhilarating it is all worth it.

To look back and see the amazing height I have achieved and the spectacular view of the valley and surrounding mountains and to see a new vista of a completely different range of mountains before me is a fabulous experience and this happens most days.

Because of the height of these mountains I don't cover a lot of crow miles each day and I can get very tired especially if the descents are very long. I am so often overtaken and so far, I think I have only overtaken a fat lady and a family with little kids! If the trail says 4 1/2 hours I know it will take me 6 and that's Enough!

One day I misread a sign post, these are measured in hiking Times and not Distance, and there are so many paths everywhere, I ended up taking a short cut which was also a 300 vertical meters extra climb. I became short of water and there was a little building ahead, I thought I could ask there for some.

As I tiredly came around the corner it turned out to be a cafe! Hurray I sat in the sun and had an omlette and raspberry tart!

The sun went in, storm clouds gathered as they often do in the afternoon, and I helped the cafe owner quickly put the chairs away. I couldn't carry on in bad weather, so I put up the tent behind the cafe and stayed in it for the next Five hours of thunder, lightning and heavy rain. About 9 pm the rain stopped, and the full moon and stars shone beautifully.

The next morning, I looked out onto the snowy mountains glowing rosy pink in the sunrise. Happily, I could then hike the high route across the crests of several peaks. After a short steep climb up, a couple passed me and said they thought they were brave to do the route until they saw elderly me with a rucksack. So, then I felt brave until I was passed by an ,8-year-old boy and his grandad hiking the same peaks!

After an energy sapping descent from ,2600 meters to 1250 meters I was thoroughly worn out and so deserve a day of rest! More climbs tomorrow! I am spending tonight in a little hotel opposite this amazing waterfall, avoiding the campsite as its now raining! Bx

6th August - I am writing in the cafe of a campsite as its pouring with rain as it seems to most afternoons.

Later it is very likely to be a thunder storm, typical mountain weather. The mornings are usually very sunny and hot. Unfortunately all my washing is on the line Mark gave me. The rain will probably clear tonight and the stars will be fabulous, absolutely brilliant.

I am having such a great time as each day brings a new mountain to climb and at the top a new view of another spectacular valley. At the moment I am in an area close to the Italian border and there are loads of ruined forts left over from various conflicts. Last night I camped in the parade ground of one such Fort.

I keep meeting different people on the trail, last night it was an American couple doing the same as me but at a faster pace!

Sometimes I can walk for quite a while and meet no one until the moment I need a toilet break along side the path and then hikers appear from all directions! ' Ne t'inquiète pas, nous sommes femmes aussi, alors on comprends. On fais la même chose!' i e. Don't worry we are women too, and we all do it!

The flora changes with the altitude, I can be hiking through a pine forest then an alpine meadow and before long ( or very long depending on how high!) be on a rocky trail where it's very desolate. In the meadows there are marmots every where chattering away and where there are flowers there are hundreds of butterflies of all different colours. If I stand still for a moment I am covered in them.

Can you spot me in the  picture? — **Can you spot me in the picture?**

Yesterday when I was on a very high rocky path an ibex ran across the path. It is wonderful to climb a steep path up a mountain and suddenly see a whole new vista open up.

I also love to look back at the previous valley and see just what I have achieved.

Every day has a different challenge but I'm still going strong and getting stronger Bx

14th August I am continuing to make progress along the trail.

There has been a marked difference recently as I get further south, the path is often bordered with lavender which smells wonderful as you brush past it. There are only a few snow patches now and again but the waterfalls and streams are often full as there seem to be so many thunderstorms. Fortunately these are predictably in the late afternoons and so I am in shelter by then as the rain is torrential. The early morning starts are chilly but it soon warms up and then is sunny for a while until the clouds build up. The high meadows are full of scampering, chirping marmots and I have even seen baby ones.

Every one is so friendly and I quite often walk a short way with other hikers, most people are faster than me but reaching a village or refuge there is often someone I have met before. Everyone takes photos on their phones and there is a lot of swapping around of phones at special views or air dropping over supper.

People always seem to congregate at the Cols (mountain passes). There are quite a few English people doing the path and not all of them young. I spent a couple of days with another 66 year old lady and met another one was 72!

Now it's a couple of days further on and the last two days have been wonderful, mostly because the weather has improved and I can walk further if it's not going to thunder on me.

If I am staying at a lower elevation then the morning hike will be Up through a forest, the trees will give way to alpine meadow and then the path will become nothing but rocks until reaching the pass another fantastic view of a different valley and the walking path is reversed

Recently, after a high climb, I came to a beautiful hidden valley with its own little stream perfect for camping. Soon a herd of sheep came to join me accompanied by five huge white Patou dogs which are bred to protect the sheep from wolves. There are signs warning hikers not to go near them. However they all came over to check out the campers and were so lovely and friendly.

Today as I left the valley they came to me again along with more from the next valley! A sheep had also been very affectionate to me and the shepherd said it had been bottle fed, it had to be lured away from me by the shepherd with some corn. The next morning the big white patio dogs came back to visit and as I climbed over to the next valley the patou from That valley were friendly as well and two of them followed me, wanting patting, right to the next valley. Here there were patou from a third herd who woofed the friendly ones away.

That night I was in a mountain Vacherie / refuge and couldn't camp til the cows had been milked and moved off! But later camped to close by the donkeys shed as it was the only flat place. In the morning the Guardian asked if I had heard the Wolf howling in the night...thankfully not! The farm was full of dogs , kittens, cats, cows donkeys and chickens so lovely dairy food for supper and breakfast.

I am making very good progress and in a couple of days or so should come to the parting of the ways where me and most others hikers will change from the GR5 to the GR52. None of the French will do the hike to Nice as it is too low down, boring and Hot! The GR52 stays higher in the mountains and so is much cooler and the scenery especially spectacular through The Valley of Marvels. I may now be in Menton in about two weeks.

There was a very friendly German lady in the refuge last night who was very political and I see she is waiting for the gite to open like me so no doubt more politics over supper!