Camino from Bologna, Italy to Toulouse France

[Pelegrino]

Hello!

Does anyone know of a Camino from Bologna, Italy to Tolouse, France?

Would like to do a Camino next year. Thinking about starting in Lourdes and walking to Tolouse. From there I would either like to walk to St. Jeann to do the Camino Frances (did this in 2019), or walk to Bologna, Italy. Any help would be appreciated!

 

[DLJ]

Hello!

Does anyone know of a Camino from Bologna, Italy to Tolouse, France?

Would like to do a Camino next year. Thinking about starting in Lourdes and walking to Tolouse. From there I would either like to walk to St. Jeann to do the Camino Frances (did this in 2019), or walk to Bologna, Italy. Any help would be appreciated!

From Toulouse the Camino goes over the Pyrennes and joins the Camino Frances. You don't have to go to St. Jean Pied de Port.

 

[andycohn]

Hello!

Does anyone know of a Camino from Bologna, Italy to Tolouse, France?

Would like to do a Camino next year. Thinking about starting in Lourdes and walking to Tolouse. From there I would either like to walk to St. Jeann to do the Camino Frances (did this in 2019), or walk to Bologna, Italy. Any help would be appreciated!

Should be a piece of cake! Only about 1300 k from Toulouse to Bologna. Take the Arles camino east until it ends. Then you'll pick up the Via Aurelia, which eventually turns into the Via della Costa near the Italian border. Follow that down past Genova and through the Cinque Terre (I recommend the higher route to avoid the tourist throngs), eventually skirting La Spezia and hooking up with the Via Francigena at Sarzana. After a brief stint on the Via Francigena, you'll head east across the Apennines on various CAI trails, eventually hitting the Fiume di Reno, which you'll follow into Sasso Marconi, where you'll pick up the Via degli Dei for delivery to the Piazza Maggiore in the heart of Bologna.

Easy-peezy! Let us know how it goes.

Here's a gpx track to follow, courtesy of mapy.cz: https://mapy.cz/s/majapujula

 

[Pelegrino]

Oh wow! This is awesome! Thank you so much - this is very helpful!

 

[andycohn]

Oh wow! This is awesome! Thank you so much - this is very helpful!

When I saw your proposed (wild and crazy) journey, I put together that itinerary mostly for fun, not thinking anyone would really follow it.

BUT -- if you're really serious about it, I think it's readily doable, along the caminos I outlined, at least up to Sarzana on the Via Francigena. After that, however, I'm not sure I'd follow the hodgepodge of trails across the Apennines suggested by mapy.cz because there doesn't seem to be much in the way of services and places to stay.

Instead, if I were doing this wild journey myself, I'd probably elect to stay on the Via Francigena from Sarzana down to Lucca (awesome, wonderful small city by itself). At that point, I'd veer off onto the Cammino di San Jacopo over to Pistoia -- plainly shown on mapy.cz -- and from Pistoia I'd take the newly-marked Via Francesca della Sambuca. Here's a website, in English, devoted to it:
https://www.discoveraltorenoterme.it/the-via-francesca-della-sambuca/ Mapy.cz does not specifically label the route as the Via Sambuca, but it can easily be traced on it (or the tracking app. of your choice). Looks like you could also stay on the Cammino di San Jacopo past Pistoia and, a little north of Prato, you'd run into the Via della Lana e della Seta, which would take you directly into Bologna as well.

A further alternative for traversing the Apennines -- if you're not wedded to every f'ing inch -- would be to take the train from Lucca to Florence -- then picking up the Via degli Dei from Florence to Bologna, which is a wonderful and well-supported trail.

If you really undertake this journey, you MUST let us know how it went.

 

[andycohn]

My head's been spinning with the possibilities since I wrote the last post.

As it turns out, the Cammino di San Jacopo, which you'll pick up in Lucca, actually runs all the way to Florence, so no need to take a train from Lucca to Florence if you want to pick up the Via degli Dei up to Bologna.

So that makes 3 well-established trails -- the Sambuca, the Lana e Seta, and the Via degli Dei -- heading off from the San Jacopo across the Apennines into Bologna. Here's a great web site I found on the San Jacopo: https://www.ilcamminodisanjacopo.it/. (If you don't speak Italian, open it in google chrome for English translation).

But why stop in Bologna (even though it's my favorite city in the universe)? You could -- for example -- take the Sambuca trail to reach Bologna, then turn around and head back across the Apennines to Florence along the Via degli Dei. And then in Florence you pick up the Way of St. Frances, which would take you to La Verna, Assisi and ultimately to Rome. Once you get to Rome, of course, you re-join the Via Francigena, whose southern extension takes you all the way down to the heel of the boot.

Or --- follow the newly-created Sentiero Italia (7200 kilometers in all) either north from Bologna to the Dolomites and Alps, or south to the toe of the boot and thence across Sicily, with help from a ferry ride across the Straits of Messina.

The possibilities are endless!

 

[SandmanATHF]

Hi @andycohn, I am thinking about doing something like you have listed here. I currently live in Bologna, and was planning to hike the Camino Frances in August, but I am now wondering if I should just walk all the way from Bologna to Santiago. I have ~60 days free, and I have a history of wilderness thru-hiking (AZT) doing upwards of 50kms a day (rarely, but some days) with a much heavier pack (food, tent, etc).

You seem ot have a great understanding of the trails here in Europe. Woudl you be up to gameplanning a route?

 

[andycohn]

Hi @andycohn, I am thinking about doing something like you have listed here. I currently live in Bologna, and was planning to hike the Camino Frances in August, but I am now wondering if I should just walk all the way from Bologna to Santiago. I have ~60 days free, and I have a history of wilderness thru-hiking (AZT) doing upwards of 50kms a day (rarely, but some days) with a much heavier pack (food, tent, etc).

You seem ot have a great understanding of the trails here in Europe. Woudl you be up to gameplanning a route?

I'm flattered! But as I said above, I was just having a good time playing around with mapy.cz to plan out what sounded like a wild and crazy adventure. Of all the trails I mentioned, or that might be on your route, the only ones I've actually walked are the Via degli Dei from Rome to Florence, the Via Francigena the length of Italy down to Rome, the trail through Cinque Terre, and the Arles / Aragones / Frances combo from Oloron St. Marie in France to Santiago. The rest were all suggested by mapy.cz.

Having "planned" it all out on paper -- at least from Bologna to Toulouse -- it does seem pretty doable, however, with lots of infrastructure so you wouldn't have to carry a ton of camping gear (unless you want to, of course). There's also guidebooks and apps to steer you to places to stay. And after Toulouse, it gets even easier (for planning purposes, at least), as you'll be on the most-travelled part of the Camino de Arles (aka the Via Tolosana), which feeds into the Camino Aragones at the border with Spain, which, in turn, runs into the Camino Frances not far from Pamplona, which then takes you all the way to Santiago de Compostela.

The big constraint, though, seems to me to be the amount of time you have. The route sketched by mapy.cz is roughly 2500 km., which means you'd have to average more than 40 k per day for your 60 days. (There's a lot of other ways to get from Bologna to Santiago, but they'd be even longer). I think 2500 k in 60 days would be too much for any ordinary human being, but if you've through-hiked the AZT, walking as much as 50k a day with all your camping gear, you're obviously extra-ordinary, so maybe you'll find this a relaxing jaunt.

As a starter, I'd suggest mapy.cz, which is free and contains all the hiking trails in the entire universe -- from the AZT on down. It's really easy to plan something on it, just entering starting and ending points and then playing around with what it suggests. But as an experienced hiker, I'm sure you have your own favorites.

I'll be happy to chip in my 2 cents, for what they're worth, but there's also a ton of people on this forum always eager to help out. If you post further, I'd suggest a really specific question, though, or else you'll get back a bunch of irrelevant stuff from people trying to be helpful. For example, "Anyone have experience on the Via Aurelia in France" rather than just a general query about hiking in France.

And of course, you might PM @Pelegrino, who started this thread and may actually have walked from Bologna to Toulouse already.

I'll be eager to hear further about your adventures. Lucky you to be living in Bologna.

Update: If you search for Via Aurelia and Via della Costa on this Forum, using the Search button, you'll find a bunch of posts already. Not to mention on the other, better-known trails I've mentioned.

 

[JabbaPapa]

The normal route from or towards Bologna in relation to Toulouse would be via the Francigena variant from Arles and then over the Alps towards Torino, or from Bologna to Torino then over the Alps towards Arles in the other direction.

 

[SandmanATHF]

Okay, thank you everyone. The distance is also a big worry for me, specifically the idea of running along the trail to finish it but not enjoying it along the way. I would like to stop and enjoy some of the spots along the way (Lucca, Monaco, Nice, Marseille, Leon, Pampolona, etc).

This is my current map:
https://en.mapy.cz/s/novudevata

Bologna - Pistoia: Via Francesca della Sambuca
Pisotia - Lucca - Pisa - Luca: Via San Jacopo
Lucca - Sarzana: Via Francigena
Sarzana - Mentone: Via della Costa or Alternative Map
Mentone - Arles: Via Aurelia
Arles - Oloron Sainte Marie: Via Arles
Oloron Sainte Marie - Saint Jean Pied de Port: None
Saint Jean Pied de Port - Santiago: Via Francese

This is about 2,600km over 76 days would be just over the 34kms/day. Even if I can get 5 more days, it really doesn't bring the average down too much. I think I would try to keep an average of 35kms on walking days and leave 5 zeros/near zeros for the cities i mentioned above.

The portion of this that worries me the most is along the coast. I would be planning to start this August 15th, and I have hesitation that I would be able to find places to stay as the area is so busy for the summer.

 

[andycohn]

Wow! That's impressive navigation. In theory, it looks doable, but I have no first-hand experience with anything between the end of the Cinque Terre in Italy and Oleron St-Marie in France.

Some suggestions / questions:

1. Are you planning to skip the Pistoia - Lucca section? The Cammino di San Jacopo does connect the two places, and it has (what appears to be) a very useful website, referenced in my post #6, above.

2. Looks like your route on the Cammino Della Costa avoids Cinque Terre completely. Given the crowds there in summer, that's probably a good thing. And I see you've found the guidebooks published by Terre di Mezzo, which are quite helpful.

3. It also looks like most of your route along the southern coast of France avoids going through the big cities, but if you're worried about accommodations in the bigger cities, you could simply check a site like booking.com to see what's available tomorrow. That will give you a sense of availability in general. For example, checking Nice for tomorrow night -- a Saturday -- shows nothing in the way of inexpensive hotels, but quite a few hostels where you can get a bed for around $50 American. (I have no idea what your budget is, of course).

4. If you're worried about time pressures, you could consider skipping the section across southern France, which seems to have the least walkers' infrastructure. Of course, I have no personal familiarity with this stretch, and you might want to check out some of the blogs of the people who have walked the Via Aurelia and / or the Cammino della Costa.

5. When you get to Oleron St. Marie, you might consider staying on the Camino de Arles, instead of heading over to St. Jean Pied de Port and the start of the Camino Frances. The Arles route turns into the Camino Aragones at the Somport pass, which is the border with Spain, and joins the Camino Frances just past Pamplona. (if you want to go into Pamplona itself, mapy.cz will show you a cut-off that will take you there from near the end of the Aragonese). The Arles / Aragones route will give you a much more tranquil entry into Spain than going via St. Jean Pied de Port, and IMHO, it's a much more beautiful traverse of the Pyrenees. There's also plenty of pilgrim infrastructure on the Arles - Aragones combo, and you won't have to fight for a bed as you will along the first few stages of the Frances.

6. If you find the Frances too crowded for your taste, you could cut off it at Ponferrada and follow the Camino Invierno into Santiago. The last 100 kilometers on the Frances, from Sarria onwards, will be incredibly crowded, so this gives you an alternative. Of course, you may welcome the company!

7. The Spanish web-site, gronze.com, is a terrific source for information, especially on available, pilgrim -friendly accommodations. It has sections covering the Via Francigena, the Arles router, and all the possibile caminos you'll follow in Spain

That's my 2 cents for the day! You've enabled me to avoid doing any planning for my own camino coming up in September. I definitely find it more fun to plan someone else's life than my own.

 

[JabbaPapa]

I am sorry that I did not see this thread earlier.

I have walked most of the proposed route.

The only real mistake I can see in the Italian section is Pistoia > Lucca instead of Pistoia > Pisa.

Yes you can do Pistoia > Lucca > Pisa, but in any case, skipping Pisa is more or less a crime.

After Saint-Raphaël, you really need to go via Roquebrune-sur-Argens, Saint-Maximin, and Aix-en-Provence because of the support network, the better walking and better pilgrimage culture (including the one Albergue in the region), and also because it's just the historic route.

I have DIY'd in the region myself, and it's just more pain than gain.

Marseilles should be outright and actively avoided !! I walked through the city once, and it was not a worthwhile experience.

After that it's fairly classic.

2. The crowds in mid-summer on the Cinque Terre will be enormous, and I hear that access on the main trail is now limited.

Neither the Way to Rome nor the Camino pass through the Cinque Terre ; though there are occasional pleasant views from up there into them.

There is a Camino support network on the French part to Arles, but contacting them might involve a little bit of luck ; which is another reason to follow the Provençal Way proper instead of your own DIY

 

[SandmanATHF]

Wow! That's impressive navigation. In theory, it looks doable, but I have no first-hand experience with anything between the end of the Cinque Terre in Italy and Oleron St-Marie in France.

Some suggestions / questions:

1. Are you planning to skip the Pistoia - Lucca section? The Cammino di San Jacopo does connect the two places, and it has (what appears to be) a very useful website, referenced in my post #6, above.

2. Looks like your route on the Cammino Della Costa avoids Cinque Terre completely. Given the crowds there in summer, that's probably a good thing. And I see you've found the guidebooks published by Terre di Mezzo, which are quite helpful.

3. It also looks like most of your route along the southern coast of France avoids going through the big cities, but if you're worried about accommodations in the bigger cities, you could simply check a site like booking.com to see what's available tomorrow. That will give you a sense of availability in general. For example, checking Nice for tomorrow night -- a Saturday -- shows nothing in the way of inexpensive hotels, but quite a few hostels where you can get a bed for around $50 American. (I have no idea what your budget is, of course).

4. If you're worried about time pressures, you could consider skipping the section across southern France, which seems to have the least walkers' infrastructure. Of course, I have no personal familiarity with this stretch, and you might want to check out some of the blogs of the people who have walked the Via Aurelia and / or the Cammino della Costa.

5. When you get to Oleron St. Marie, you might consider staying on the Camino de Arles, instead of heading over to St. Jean Pied de Port and the start of the Camino Frances. The Arles route turns into the Camino Aragones at the Somport pass, which is the border with Spain, and joins the Camino Frances just past Pamplona. (if you want to go into Pamplona itself, mapy.cz will show you a cut-off that will take you there from near the end of the Aragonese). The Arles / Aragones route will give you a much more tranquil entry into Spain than going via St. Jean Pied de Port, and IMHO, it's a much more beautiful traverse of the Pyrenees. There's also plenty of pilgrim infrastructure on the Arles - Aragones combo, and you won't have to fight for a bed as you will along the first few stages of the Frances.

6. If you find the Frances too crowded for your taste, you could cut off it at Ponferrada and follow the Camino Invierno into Santiago. The last 100 kilometers on the Frances, from Sarria onwards, will be incredibly crowded, so this gives you an alternative. Of course, you may welcome the company!

7. The Spanish web-site, gronze.com, is a terrific source for information, especially on available, pilgrim -friendly accommodations. It has sections covering the Via Francigena, the Arles router, and all the possibile caminos you'll follow in Spain

That's my 2 cents for the day! You've enabled me to avoid doing any planning for my own camino coming up in September. I definitely find it more fun to plan someone else's life than my own.

Great, thank you so much for the help. This is exactly the type of feedback I was looking for when I orriginally asked for your help, so thank you!

1: No, I wasn’t planning skipping it, but wasn’t sure the correct route. Thank you for the suggestion, I’ll update my post.

3: I think I’d enjoy hitting the bigger cities though. Which are you referencing I am missing? I tried to change the route to include Nice and Marseille. Based on Jabba's post, I actually just removed Marseille and St Tropez from my newest route (in my post after this). Maybe I will train into towns and train back to the trail.

5: I’ll keep this in mind when I get there. I may be (Most likely) so starved of community that I may just try to jump on the Frances as fast as possible in SJPP. This new plan will probably put me right during the high season though.

7: Thank you, I will check it out. I would love to stay in Pilgrim accommodation as much as possible but I realize there probably isn’t very much along this route until I reach SJPP.

Regarding budget, I have no worries on budget whatsoever. But, I would like to stay in Albergues or churches or other community places as much as possible for the experience/community building. I am actually dredding the idea of having to stay in a fancy hotel by myself every night while doing this (disregarding budget), and that is my biggest hesitation of doing this route from Bologna to SJPP given I doubt there will be very many pilgrim accomadations. I want to see people, hear stories, eat with others, and grow with others. I have found that generally I can meet people, even if they are not hikers when traveling, but I realize I’ll be traveling in some small cities and I only speak Italian and English which they may not speak. I am not sure this route from Bologna will have that community portion I am searching for. This is also why I was attempting to keep my average KMs a bit lower in general. If I am averaging 40+/day, I will not find a trail family.

I appreciate your help! I am about at 90% convinced to do this route now, starting August 14th or 15th. With a plan to build distance the first week, knock out some big days for a few weeks (I think I could average 40 given the cities fall in the right spots) and this should be a section that there is not a lot of pilgrim community, and then I will slow back down once I get on the Frances to try to enjoy it and the community a bit more. Although the idea of skipping the French coast portion does sound nice, I’d like to walk the whole thing if possible. But I cannot deny that cutting out 200-300 kms makes it so much easier to smell the flowers along the way. Maybe my ideas on this will change along my Camino.

 

[SandmanATHF]

I am sorry that I did not see this thread earlier.

I have walked most of the proposed route.

The only real mistake I can see in the Italian section is Pistoia > Lucca instead of Pistoia > Pisa.

Yes you can do Pistoia > Lucca > Pisa, but in any case, skipping Pisa is more or less a crime.

After Saint-Raphaël, you really need to go via Roquebrune-sur-Argens, Saint-Maximin, and Aix-en-Provence because of the support network, the better walking and better pilgrimage culture (including the one Albergue in the region), and also because it's just the historic route.

I have DIY'd in the region myself, and it's just more pain than gain.

Marseilles should be outright and actively avoided !! I walked through the city once, and it was not a worthwhile experience.

After that it's fairly classic.

Neither the Way to Rome nor the Camino pass through the Cinque Terre ; though there are occasional pleasant views from up there into them.

There is a Camino support network on the French part to Arles, but contacting them might involve a little bit of luck ; which is another reason to follow the Provençal Way proper instead of your own DIY

Thank you, I am having a little tough time finding these routes on the internet so your experience is super useful. My expectation was that I will not meet any other pilgrims doing this route until I get to SJPP. I was surprised to hear you say there is even an Albergue in the region. Are all of these routes marked along the way, or what is the best way to ensure I am on trail? Is it possible to find pilgrim places to stay (churches or albergues)? Additionally, in the USA, on our Long-trails, we have something called Trail Angels where they support the network by either helping hikers or even giving them a place to stay. Is that something on these Caminos? How would you go about finding them if so? I am not worried about budget whatsoever, but find that these type of accomodations really amplify the experience and community which is the important part for me.

1: Pistoia - Lucca - Pisa seems to be the route I see on the map using the Via San Jacopo that Andy mentioned, I don't see how to do Pistoia - Pisa - Luca

2: Saint Rapheal/French Section looks like it does because I was trying to get into St. Tropez, Marseille. I'll remove them from the map update. If i really want to go, I can train/taxi into them for a day or half-day. I would love to see the FFL place in Marseille....Maybe my camino would stop there

3: I am also a bit confused on both your and Andys comments regarding Cinque Terre, what I am seeing on this map, the path takes you right on the coast in (what I think is Cinque Terre) Vernazza to Levanto. I am only asking because Andy also mentioned me missing the big cities in France on the original route (which I didn’t think I was) so unsure if the map is slightly different for us or if I am just misunderstanding Cinque Terre.

4: I dont like that Nice is an in-and-out to get to the city. Unsure if there is something better?

Based on these update:

Mapy.cz

NejpoužÃvanÄjÅ¡Ã mapový portál v ÄR s celou Åadou tématických map - základnÃ, turistickou, cyklistickou, dopravnà a plno dalÅ¡Ãch. NabÃzà možnost reálného leteckého, panoramatického nebo 3D pohledu. Rozsáhlé množstvà obsahu, firem a turistických bodů zájmu. UmožÅuje...

en.mapy.cz

Please (@andycohn @JabbaPapa) feel free to take this map and make changes to it so I can understand correctly each of your thoughts. Sorry, this is all very new to me (the caminos in Europe) so learning as I go.

Another question I have is regarding shoes. I will need another pair of trail runners, maybe two, and I use Altra (which is hard to find in the EU I think) because I have found the zero heel drop significantly helps my knee pain. I am unsure if Altra's are hard to find in EU, or just Italy. I am thinking I can order some to the last town in Italy (I know an Italian company that imports) but after that, I am a bit worried.

 

[SandmanATHF]

@JabbaPapa one other question, I would really love some stamps on my Camino passport along this route. How do you go about this? Walk into a church and ask? I am thinking particularly here in Bologna, I would love a stamp from San Luca and/or San Petronio but it seems something they don’t normally do. I will ask them for sure, but I’d like a stamp to show where I started at least.

 

[andycohn]

Great, thank you so much for the help. This is exactly the type of feedback I was looking for when I orriginally asked for your help, so thank you!

1: No, I wasn’t planning skipping it, but wasn’t sure the correct route. Thank you for the suggestion, I’ll update my post.

3: I think I’d enjoy hitting the bigger cities though. Which are you referencing I am missing? I tried to change the route to include Nice and Marseille. Based on Jabba's post, I actually just removed Marseille and St Tropez from my newest route (in my post after this). Maybe I will train into towns and train back to the trail.

5: I’ll keep this in mind when I get there. I may be (Most likely) so starved of community that I may just try to jump on the Frances as fast as possible in SJPP. This new plan will probably put me right during the high season though.

7: Thank you, I will check it out. I would love to stay in Pilgrim accommodation as much as possible but I realize there probably isn’t very much along this route until I reach SJPP.

Regarding budget, I have no worries on budget whatsoever. But, I would like to stay in Albergues or churches or other community places as much as possible for the experience/community building. I am actually dredding the idea of having to stay in a fancy hotel by myself every night while doing this (disregarding budget), and that is my biggest hesitation of doing this route from Bologna to SJPP given I doubt there will be very many pilgrim accomadations. I want to see people, hear stories, eat with others, and grow with others. I have found that generally I can meet people, even if they are not hikers when traveling, but I realize I’ll be traveling in some small cities and I only speak Italian and English which they may not speak. I am not sure this route from Bologna will have that community portion I am searching for. This is also why I was attempting to keep my average KMs a bit lower in general. If I am averaging 40+/day, I will not find a trail family.

I appreciate your help! I am about at 90% convinced to do this route now, starting August 14th or 15th. With a plan to build distance the first week, knock out some big days for a few weeks (I think I could average 40 given the cities fall in the right spots) and this should be a section that there is not a lot of pilgrim community, and then I will slow back down once I get on the Frances to try to enjoy it and the community a bit more. Although the idea of skipping the French coast portion does sound nice, I’d like to walk the whole thing if possible. But I cannot deny that cutting out 200-300 kms makes it so much easier to smell the flowers along the way. Maybe my ideas on this will change along my Camino.

1. There are other possibilities, too, on well-marked routes to get from Bologna to Lucca. See my posts #5 and 6, above. Via degli Dei, out of Bologna down to Florence, will be most traveled. Jabba Papa mentioned Pisa, but it is a detour from Lucca. You'd have to walk south from Lucca and then turn around and come back to the Via Francigena. Beautiful city, but might be best done as a day trip when you return to Bologna (and when the crowds have abated).

3. Wasn't suggesting you skip any cities. But if you're pressed for time, the stretch between Sarzana on the Francigena and Arles at the start of the Arles route will have the least pilgrim infrastructure and (I'm guessing) it's the stretch where you'll be least likely to meet other walkers, so some chunk of that might be a logical part to skip. A site like Trainline or Omio will direct you to train and bus routes. Again, I have no personal experience of walking in that area, so I'm simply making an inference based on the lack of information available about walking routes there (which suggests that there aren't that many walkers). Also, in France you're least likely to meet people who speak English -- let alone Italian. In Spain you'll do fine, though. And of course there's google translate on your phone. Or an app like Say Hi.

5. Going by way of St. Jean Pied de Port instead of walking the Arles / Aragones combo. from Oloron St. Marie will also save you about 75 k of walking, so might be a better choice for you. There's an obvious junction near Oloron St. Marie. If you want to head to St. Jean Pied de Port, head right on the Voie de Piemonte (aka GR78). I haven't walked that stretch, but it should be clearly marked, and gronze.com has a section on it. It will be beaucoup crowded between SJPDP and Pamplona, though, especially in September, so once you figure out when you're going to get there, you might want to reserve a place a few days ahead. ALL accommodation in that area will be pilgrim-oriented.

7. In general, Gronze.com will direct you to pilgrim-friendly accommodations where you'll find other walkers. As mentioned, it covers the Via Francigena in Italy, the Arles route, the Piemonte route, the Aragones, and all the routes in Spain. In France -- at least on the Arles route onwards -- there will be plenty of gites (the equivalent of the pilgrim albergues / hostels), and chambres d'hotes, guest bedrooms in people's houses, so you'll have opportunities to meet receptive hosts and other walkers. The Miam Miam Dodo series of guidebooks in France are also fantastic for their wealth of detail on accommodations and infrastructure. In French, but easy to figure out.

Don't have any suggestions on shoes, I'm afraid. I know there's a Decathlon right in the heart of Bologna, and they may have other zero-drop shoes.

I'll try and update the mapy.cz trail, but heading out now for a walk with my local camino group in the San Francisco area where I live.