The original plan was to spend two weeks in the Pyrenees again, but the weather looked terrible for the entire first week, so we decided to skip the first week, and choose to work on things at home instead. We learned a lot from our last Pyrenees adventure, so this time we didn’t plan to hike quite so far, that way if we get delayed we can still make it to the car and get home in time, but we also checked out loops we could take near the end to extend our trip if we finish early.
We set an alarm for 4 AM, I woke up at 3:30. The drive from Trier Germany to Cauterets France takes 12 hours on the highway with tolls and we hoped to get there in time for the last bus from Cauterets to Lourdes at 18:05, so we planned to leave at 5 AM and only stop for gas and bathroom breaks. Lunch and car snacks were already packed. The plan is to leave the car in Cauterets then take the bus to Lourdes, then a train to Pau and another train to Oloron and a bus to Estaut where we walk to Lescun and start our hike. If we don’t make the car drop off today we will have to do it tomorrow at 6 AM, and the next train to Pau wouldn’t be until 11:45, so not only will it let us sleep in, but also saves us a bunch of time (although presumably if we took the car early in the morning we could go back to the hotel and shower and eat breakfast).
The drive was as good as a 12 hour drive can be. I drove for 4 or 5 hours, then we switched for 4 hours, then switched again. We ate while driving.
We managed to make it to Cauterets at 17:55, with just enough time to change clothes and throw out our leftover car food , hit the bathroom, and get on the bus. We got a hotel in Lourdes, got dinner and crashed.
Day 2 (03.09)
We slept in and enjoyed a last shower before grabbing the train to Pau. Train to Pau no problem, train to Oloron, no problem! The bus from Oloron? Apparently not running right now. The bus does run from another town where the train goes called Bedus, but there were no trains for the next two and a half hours. So we got a baguette and pastry from a pastry shop that were amazing and ate some cheese we had with us for lunch. Then we went wandering in town and they happened to have a local festival going on! Mostly we walked around and checked stuff out, had a coffee and glass of wine then headed back to the train station. In the process we met a German guy who was in the same situation, except he was trying to get to Spain to start the El Camino de Santiago.
We got the train to Bedus, and then to a stop on the side of the road where we started walking to the mountain valley town of Lescun. The walk was uphill and there was even a farmer bringing his sheep down the road as we hiked up.
When we got there we headed to the campground, got a site and got ready to start our adventure.
