Jyrki Wahlstedt
Member
- Time of past OR future Camino
- 2018 (2024)
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Hi @Jyrki Wahlstedt, first of all, respect for having walked from Lübeck to Eisenach!About the future: does anyone have any experience about the situation on the route I planned after Eisenach, that being Vacha - Fulda - Würzburg - Rothenburg - Rottenburg - Fribourg (- Hericourt - Thann - Beaune - Cluny - Le Puy-en-Velay)? How are the services, how are the paths? I guess France is a bit better, especially after Le Puy-en-Velay. Any comments appreciated
I've done the route via Metz and Dijon. Has a good network of acceuil jacquaires apparently, but those are not always available. Since I didn't like making phone calls days before, I preferred the campsites (with some detours and long days, that worked most of the time).The Route from Metz - Dijon - Le Puy is still a very big questionmark for me. But I'd guess, with every step getting closer to Santiago the chance of meeting another pilgrim and finding pilgrim oriented infrastructure gets bigger. Once in Le Puy it should not be any issue anymore.
I’ve also done a different route out of Germany (Cologne - Metz - Dijon - Cluny).About the future: does anyone have any experience about the situation on the route I planned after Eisenach, that being Vacha - Fulda - Würzburg - Rothenburg - Rottenburg - Fribourg (- Hericourt - Thann - Beaune - Cluny - Le Puy-en-Velay)? How are the services, how are the paths? I guess France is a bit better, especially after Le Puy-en-Velay. Any comments appreciated
Hello Jyrki, I am going to start from Erfurt south (It is also called the Way of the Women honoring three powerful saints in the middle ages) through Coburg till Bamberg (then heading over to a non- Jakobsweg walk, the Rennsteig but both in Thueringer Wald) at the end of August and will let you know how that goes..... next summer am planning on walking from the Russian border to Gdansk all the way across to Hamburg, and am accepting not running into many pilgrims nor much support, but pilgrimages will be that way sometimes.. it is a personal deep journey that I accept as that... where millions of people, especially women and children fled from East Prussia, my mother having been one of them... Ultriea!Dear All,
on Jun 12th I started my pilgrimage on Via Scandinavica, from Lubeck to Eisenach. My idea initially was to go finally to Santiago, but… This route seems to be little travelled, because I met only one other person walking the same route. One thing following from that is that services were a bit scarce, to say the least. The other thing was that paths were partly very overgrown, so that without having the route coordinates in my mobile I would have been totally lost. The biggest problem, though, was that at times it was truly difficult to find a place to sleep in. Occasionally, then, I had to resort to bus or train to reach the next bed.
This is of course a catch-22, as the small numbers of walkers can't support albergue type of places.
One feature common to Spain is that people being afraid of dogs should consider twice. Once near a village, Ebstorf, I saw a lonely dog with no human in sight. The dog ran to me, sniffed a bit, and then ran away. I never saw the owner.
With all these problems I decided to stop at Eisenach.
An additional problem was that harvesters &c had very much broken the wider forest roads turning them very muddy.
About the future: does anyone have any experience about the situation on the route I planned after Eisenach, that being Vacha - Fulda - Würzburg - Rothenburg - Rottenburg - Fribourg (- Hericourt - Thann - Beaune - Cluny - Le Puy-en-Velay)? How are the services, how are the paths? I guess France is a bit better, especially after Le Puy-en-Velay. Any comments appreciated
PS I wrote a blog: the first entry https://jyrkiwahlstedt.wordpress.com/2024/06/11/lyypekissa/, and made videos: https://www.youtube.com/@jyrkiwahlstedt1136. All texts in Finnish, unfortunately, not that well known, but one gets some idea, anyway…
next summer am planning on walking from the Russian border to Gdansk all the way across to Hamburg, and am accepting not running into many pilgrims nor much support, but pilgrimages will be that way sometimes..
That is so exciting to hear about!!!! Thank you! I have the "Love Camino" App, hoping that helps with finding accommodation? I am actually starting from our former family farm in now Poland in Masuren near previous Nikolaiken where my family had a farm for more than 600 years then walking up to Gdansk/prev Danzig where my father studied architecture then across. But will bring a small tent in case...I think you will find more support than you maybe expect. Not sure about the Polish section, but I walked from the Polish/German border to Hamburg last year on the Via Baltica. Did not meet any other pilgrims, but I did stay in pilgrim accomodation (Herbergen) most days. Support network on the German part of the Via Baltica is amazing actually..
Just a heads up: watch out for the publishing year when shopping for guides for the lesser walked routes. As the demand isn’t massive, they aren’t updated as frequently as the guides for e.g. the Spanish caminos and the accommodation info might not be up to date.Guidebooks for the routes in Germany and elsewhere, all in German but with great graphics, available in the local bookstores and here https://www.conrad-stein-verlag.de/produkt-kategorie/aktivitaeten-themen/pilgern/ (Google translate is your friend for the book titles).
Thanks for asking, I am back home now, so I try to prepare better for the next attempt@Jyrki Wahlstedt, did you make a final decision about whether to continue or jump ahead?
I have been getting a little enthusiastic about walking part of the Vacha to Würzburg/Rothenburg Jakobsweg and I looked into some online information. It isn't the comfort and ease that you have in Spain: There is no Gronze.de (THE pilgrim accommodation website for Spain), and even the websites of the local Saint James associations lack detailed information in one place for the long-distance walker - you have to click around and search for a while.
There are apparently only three specific pilgrim 'albergues' on this 180+ km path - in Vacha, in Bad Kissingen, and in Binsbach. There are lists of Gasthäuser, B&B's and pensions of course, but often it is recommended to contact the local tourist office who will find you a room. There are some working monasteries in the area that offer beds. Fulda, Bad Kissingen and Würzburg are bigger towns where it will not be difficult to get a room - for the rest I would not know. July and August is the traditional summer holiday season in this area, there may be a higher demand for beds. I guess that you have guidebooks and other documentation with you?
The local https://www.jakobus-franken.de has plenty of information about this Jakobswege section but it is in German only.
PS: In Geisa you can stay in a former jail. "Gast im Knast" - "Be a jailbird for one night". 300 years old. Looks intriguing. Prices start from €27.
Just for context, this overview is from one of the relevant websites:
View attachment 174107
Rösner?FWIW I have a friends friend and my acquaintance also in Würzburg, the family is running a bakery chain, and he was quite long number one squash player in Germany, in world rankings in top-5 at highest…
Simon, sicherlichRösner?
That is so exciting to hear about!!!! Thank you! I have the "Love Camino" App, hoping that helps with finding accommodation?
Yes I can thanks!!!! Thanks so much for the information!I think the app will be of little help. For accomodation you will depend on a guidebook. For the German section of the Via Baltica there is a guidebook by Rother Verlag. And there is the guidebook by Bernhard Weber (Via Baltica Verlag) - he has been very influential in creating the route, also sells a credencial and provides regular updates on his website. Both guidebooks contain information on pilgrim accomodation (Weber seems to be a bit more complete, the Rother guidebook also contains 'other' accomodation). In addition there is the Pilgerweg Via Baltica facebook group, which can be usefull.
I hope you can read German though.
I have a "Rösner connection", tooSimon, sicherlich
In my limited experience, 370km on the Via Imperii, you'd be correct. I saw zero pilgrims, weekend or otherwise. And day Walkers only in the immediate vicinity of towns/ villages.the many Jakobswege in Germany are not populated by long-distance walkers. It is mainly "weekend pilgrims" or day walkers who don't plan to ever get to Santiago.
That was my experience too.As far as I can tell - I don't have practical experience - the many Jakobswege in Germany are not populated by long-distance walkers. It is mainly "weekend pilgrims" or day walkers who don't plan to ever get to Santiago.
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