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Impossible Descent on GR11 and Breathtaking Views of Comapedrosa Natural Park | Day 5 – Crossing from Andorra to Spain
In this hike report we are sharing our Day 5 of GR11 trail when we hiked from the town La Massana to the Comapedrosa natural park. We woke up that day later than usual in our quiet camp spot in the forest close to the river. It was a nice idyllic place away from the path where we wish we could stay for longer. The day before was a challenging day for us when we had to do more distance than we had planned and arrived to our spot already in the dusk. So we felt broken apart and the muscles were very sore this next day. We decided to…
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The Heat Wave is Real and Extremely Long Day on GR11 Trail in Andorra | Day 4 – Engolasters, Encamp, Coll d’Ordino
On our day 4 of GR11 we hiked around 20kms from the Refugi Fontverd to the town Encamp in Andorra and arrived to Coll d’Ordino. The day before we had a hard time planning that day because we were falling a bit behind our initial plan of the hike. So we decided to divide counting all the extra distance in several days to be able to compensate it step by step. The plan for the day was to get to the town Encamp that was in 8kms going mostly downhill where we wanted to buy some food to resupply. And then we saw the major 1000m uphill further on the…
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Epic border crossing arriving to Andorra on GR11 and the Tour of a Typical Refuge | Day 3 – Vallcivera, Refugi de l’Illa, Refugi Fontverd
On our third day of hiking GR11 in Catalonia we did around 16kms from the Cabana dels Espravers, crossed the border from Spain to Andorra and arrived to the Refugi Fontverd. We slept in for half an hour because the sound of the river we camped by was quite loud and thus we didn’t hear the alarm. So we woke up at 7am instead of 6am but tried to move quickly and get out on the trail in time and escape extreme hot hours. Also we wanted to do our uphill until 12am. On the map we saw that we’ll have to conquer a 6km 800m uphill that seemed to…
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First Challenging Day of Hiking and Meeting the Sunset on GR11 in Pyrenees, Spain | Day 2 Refugi Malniu – Cabana dels Espravers
It was our second day of a GR11 section hike when we did 12kms getting from the Refugi de Malniu to the shelter Espravals in Pyrenees, Spain. For that day, we planned to start our trail as early as possible and we did wake up at 6am as we had a quiet warm night and slept quite well. Also the terrain where we camped was relatively flat so it helped a lot too. Unexpectedly there was a bit of rain that night and we even heard the thunder somewhere in the distance. But already being used to the changeable mountain weather we knew that it is a normal thing to…
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Discovering the land of old Roman Thermal Baths in Bagno Vignoni | Day 13 of Via Francigena to Castiglioni d’Orcia
It was the day 13 of Via Francigena trail when we hiked around 15 kms from San Quirico d’Orcia to the town Castiglione d’Orcia. We woke up to another sunny morning in the fields of Tuscany close to the village Quirico d’Orcia. The night was quite calm just in the evening the dogs were barking but then fortunately they were quiet. That night we felt like it was hotter than the previous ones and sleeping with stuffy air was not good. In the morning we saw the baby roe deer coming out of the bushes just beside our tent and before it saw us he was behaving so naturally and…
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Town standing on Volcano | Final Day 14 of Via Francigena from Castiglioni d’Orcia to Radicofani
It was the final day 14 of our Via Francigena trail when we hiked around 17 kms from Castiglione d’Orcia to the town Radicofani. That day we had the first rainy morning in the whole hike. At around 5am in the morning we heard the little drops of rain bouncing of our tent and it gradually became stronger. It was a good sign that the day could be a little bit cooler and we can walk easier. After yesterday’s very hot day and no shadow on the trail we were about to quit the hike and call it done. But in such weather conditions we had a chance. The roe…
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Walking through the land of endless vineyards in Tuscany | Day 12 of Via Francigena from Buonconvento to San Quirico d’Orcia
It was the 12th day of Via Francigena trail when we hiked around 13 kms from the town Buonconvento to San Quirico d’Orcia. We spend quite a disturbing night at the field we found yesterday because of the dogs from the neighboring houses that were barking all night. And so we kept awakening from time to time. But nevertheless we really liked that place because of the roe deer that were living there. We saw several of them in the evening and then in the morning as well. There was a baby and a mother that unfortunately were really shy and on alert but we still got them on film…
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Sleeping with the roe deer in the fields of Tuscany | Day 11 of Via Francigena from Siena to Buonconvento
It was the 11th day of Via Francigena trail when we hiked around 17 kms from the city Siena to the town Buonconvento. On the day 11 of our Via Francigena hike we were back on the trail after a 4 day rest in the campsite. We had a really nice time there in a secluded quiet place in the forest and had time to really recover and start fresh again. The location was one of the exceptional ones with no traffic close, very few people because of not a very popular destination and thus no noise which is really important for the good rest. So we already had a…
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Safe trail ends. Dangerous part starts. | Day 10 of Via Francigena from Monteriggioni to Siena
It was the 10th day of Via Francigena trail when we hiked around 17 kms from the town Monteriggioni to the city Siena. The morning started very early for us at 5.30am because we wanted to hike the most of the distance as early as possible. The weather was promising another crazy hot day and we didn’t want to be stroke by a heat wave. At night we didn’t sleep that well and we think we found the reason why it happened the last couple of days. It was because of the hot temperature even during the night it was not less than 20 degrees and no wind at all…
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Discovery of Million Year old Shells in the fields of Tuscany, Italy | Day 9 of Via Francigena to Monteriggioni
It was the 9th day of Via Francigena trail when we hiked around 20 kms from the village Quartaia to Monteriggioni. That night we didn’t sleep very well because of some deers coming to visit us at night and also the sounds they were making. So we felt sleepy all day long then. But fortunately no people had disturbed us there. At that campsite in the field we have found some curious things – lots and lots of shells big and small ones, some of them were just lying on the ground some built and engraved into rocks. It almost felt like we are at the bottom of the ocean…
