Camino Vasco del Interior -- online guide

[peregrina2000]

As others have mentioned, this route presents an alternative way to start your Camino -- leaving from Irun and joining the Frances in Santo Domingo de la Calzada. It is a more gentle introduction with less elevation gain. This is an extremely beautiful part of Spain.

This section of the forum has some good testimonials from forum members who walked have walked this way and recommend it.

I'm not sure how much this online source adds to what is already well known about this alternative, but there is a listing of albergues and some succinct summaries of stages. This writer proposes 9 days to complete this section, and the stages are pretty manageable, with nothing over 29 km.

I would be happy to traslate the Spanish into English, but I'm not sure it adds anything to what is already known. A nice feature is that there are google maps for each stage, which is visually helpful.

http://www.angelpilger.net/camvasint.html

Would love to hear if people are considering this route. Buen camino, Laurie

 

[jpflavin1]

Laurie:

The Google translate feature is attached to the website. It will translate to any language.

In regards to the route, this individual stayed pretty much to the Pedestrian pathways up to Zegema. There are several other options. One, which I did not take occurs, I believe, around Hernani and comes back to the route around Zerain. Fatma I believe has taken this detour and described it in a reply. There is also another option from Zerain to Zegema which I took this Spring. There is one other option where someone could choose to take this route all the way to Burgos versus Santa Domingo de la Calzada.

I like the Vasco and would recommend it as an alternative to starting in SJPdP for folks looking for a far less crowded route. That said, it is very sparsely traveled. The log book in Anduoin (spelling?) only listed 50 registered hikers for all of 2011. On the other hand you are regularly walking through towns and along pedestrian pathways the first couple of days.

It is easily done in 9 days and offers every type of terrain the Frances offers but starts much more gradually. A bonus I believe. The route is well marked but I did get lost on the mountain after the tunnel from Zegema. It was a very rainy/foggy day and I just missed a turn. My guess on a more pleasant day it would not have happened.

This route is also very Basque.

Ultreya,
Joe

 

[obinjatoo]

I am considering this route in August. This website is very useful. Thanks for posting it.