the path, there is a good inn, which will save your camping out in the
valley at all, if you are not so inclined; but the inn is so far down
the valley that it does not save you very much in the next day’s walk.
Further, you should note that all this group of valleys, the Arazas, the
Pinède (which is that through which the Cinca flows), the Velos, which
is the stream at the foot of the Col de Gaulis, the Escuain, etc., are,
unlike most others in the Pyrenees, true _ravines_. They correspond
to what Western Americans mean when they use the Spanish word Cañons,
that is _clefts_ sunk deep into the stuff of the world and bounded by
precipices upon either side. These not only make the whole district a
striking exception in the Pyrenean range, but also make the finding of
and keeping to a path necessary as it is throughout the Pyrenees, more
necessary here than anywhere else. If, for instance, you lose the path at
the head of the Arazas, where it goes up the cliffs, you will never make
the Col de Gaulis though it is less than a mile away, and if you miss the
path up to the Col of Anisclo you can never get down into the Pinède at
all.
It is worth remembering that from the foot of the Col de Gaulis a path
of sorts leads up the flank of the mountain to the Spanish side of the
Brèche de Roland. I have never followed it, but I believe it to be an
easier approach than that over the glacier upon the French side.
Once you are at Bielsa on the Cinca, you are in the centre and, as it
were, in the geographical capital of the high Sobrarbe and it is your
next business to go on eastward into the last valley, that of the Esera,
the central town of which is Venasque. Between the upper part of these
two valleys and right between these two towns lies the great mass of the
Posets, a huge mountain which lifts up in a confused way like an Atlantic
wave and is within a very few feet of being the highest in the Pyrenees.
It is a mountain which, though it is not remarkable for precipices or
for any striking sky line, should by no means be crossed (though it can
easily be ascended), but must be turned.
The straight line from Bielsa to Venasque lies slightly south of east
and is but 15 miles in length, but it runs right over the mass of the
Posets and crosses that jumble of hills only a couple of miles south of
the culminating peak. Venasque must therefore be reached by a divergence
one way or the other, and one approaches it from Bielsa by going either
to the north or to the south of the mountain group of the Posets. The
northern way is a trifle shorter but much more difficult and much more
lonely. On the other hand, it takes one into the very heart of the
highest Pyrenees, right under the least known and the most absolute part
of the barrier which they make between France and Spain. I will therefore
describe this northern way first, as I think most travellers who desire
an acquaintance with the hills will take it.
From Bielsa a path going eastward crosses the Barrosa (at the confluence
of which with the Cinca Bielsa is built), runs round the flank of the
mountain and goes right up to the Col of the Cross “De La Cruz,” 4000
feet above the town. You may know this pass, if you have a compass, by
observing that it is due east of Bielsa. To be accurate, the dead line
east and west from the top of the Col exactly strikes the northernmost
houses of the town.
The eastern descent of the Col is quite easy and once down upon the
banks of the Cinqueta, you see, half a mile to the north of you, the
hospital or refuge of Gistain. From that point you follow up the valley
north-eastward, on the right or northern bank of the stream under a steep
hill-side for a couple of miles until you come to a fairly open place
where the two upper forks of the Cinqueta meet. You cross the northern
fork and go on eastward and northward up the eastern one, still keeping
at the foot of the northern hill-side.
[Illustration: THE PASSAGE OVER THE COL DE LA CRUZ AND THE COL DE
GISTAIN]
What follows is not very easy to describe and should be carefully noted.
What you have to pick out is a particular col on the opposite slope
beyond the stream. This col is three miles or so from the fork, five from
the Refuge, and is called “the Col de Gistain.” As you go up this valley
the opposing side is formed of the buttresses of the Posets. From that
mountain four torrents descend to join the east fork of the Cinqueta,
between the place where you crossed and the col you are seeking. The
first torrent falls into the valley which you are climbing half a mile
or so after you have crossed the north fork and begun the new valley; a
second comes in about a thousand yards further on, a third about a mile
further yet, and you may see each of them coming into the stream at your
feet from down the opposing side, which consists, as I have said, in the
buttresses of the Posets.
Another way of recognizing these three torrents (and it is essential to
recognize them) is to note that between the first and the second the
slope is not violent, while between the second and the third it is a
rocky ridge.
When you have seen the third come in, you must watch _exactly a mile
further on_ for the entry of the fourth. This fourth one is your mark by
which to find the col. Just after passing in front of the mouth of this
fourth torrent, your path, such as it is, will cross the Cinqueta, turn
sharply eastward, and begin to climb up the right or northern bank of
this fourth torrent.
The ascent is not steep, and in 1500 yards you are on the _Col de
Gistain_ between 8200 and 8300 feet above the sea, and almost exactly
3000 feet above the spot where you left the north fork of the Cinqueta to
follow the eastern valley. Another way of making certain that you do not
miss the all-important turning is to count the torrents coming in upon
_your_ side, the _north_ side, of the valley; that is the torrents, each
coming in from its own ravine, which your path crosses.
They also are three in number and fairly equidistant one from another,
the first about a mile after you have crossed the north fork, the next a
mile further on, and the next just under a mile beyond that. It is after
you have crossed the third and have proceeded another 500 or 600 yards
that your path to the Col de Gistain will go off opposite to the right,
crossing the stream at your feet, and following the torrent that falls
from that opposing side.
Yet another way of making sure is to watch (if the weather is fine) for
the col itself, an unmistakable notch with a ridge of sharp rock just
to the north of it and a less abrupt arète going south of it up to the
summit of the Posets.
I have written at this length of the passage not only from the difficulty
of discovering, but also from the danger that will attend any delay in
finding it. If you go on past the turning where the path to the col goes
off eastward you may get over the wrong port on to the French side, miles
from anywhere, or you may take the rocks of the Anes Cruces and find
yourself on a ridge beyond which there is no going down either way; while
if you turn off too early you may climb right up on to the glacier of the
Posets, and lose a day and be compelled to pass a night in that frost.
Once you have got to the top of the Col de Gistain, however, you are
free. All the running water below you leads you down into the valley of
Venasque; there is no steepness and no difficulty. The rudimentary path
follows the stream, there is a little cabane on the upper waters of it,
soon the floor of the valley widens out a trifle, and four miles on, not
quite 3000 feet below the pass, is another cabane; that of the Turmo.
The path from this point becomes more definite; it crosses the stream 2
miles down in order to avoid rocks upon the southern side, recrosses it
again a mile later to negotiate a steep and narrow gorge, it comes over
once again to the northern side by a bridge a few hundred yards further
on, and almost immediately reaches the valley of the Esera at a point 9
miles or so from the summit of the pass. Here an ancient and remarkable
bridge, the Bridge of Cuberre, crosses the Esera, and enables you to gain
the wide mule track to Venasque, which town lies rather more than 2 miles
down the road.
It will be seen that the whole difficulty of this passage lies in making
certain of the Col de Gistain.
If I have exaggerated that difficulty I have fallen into an error on the
right side, for to miss the col is to fail altogether and possibly to
be in danger. If those who have approached the Col de Gistain from the
east, or who have only seen the place in clear weather, imagine it to be
discoverable under all circumstances, they are in error; indeed, if the
weather is bad, it is just as well not to attempt the passage at all.
This northern way from Bielsa to Venasque is, as I have said, the most
difficult. The southern way is as follows.
You go down the gorge to the Cinca by the road to Salinas de Sin, there
the road branches, the main part goes on down the Cinca, the side road
goes sharply off to the left up the first affluent of the Cinca, a
lateral valley which points south-east, and is that of the Cinqueta.
This road crosses the Cinca, follows the eastern or right bank of the
lateral stream for some two-thirds of a mile, then crosses over and
in about 3 miles from the crossing reaches the hamlet of Sarabillo.
Thence it proceeds, still upon the same side of the stream and facing
a considerable cliff upon the further bank, to the village of El Plan,
which lies somewhat less than 5 miles up from Sarabillo, and is reached
by crossing the stream again just before one comes to the village.
At El Plan one may repose. One will have walked by the mule paths more
than 12 miles, and there is a long way before one.
The main path goes on to the next village, that of St. Juan, and so up
the Cinqueta to the hospital of Gistain, where it joins the northern
route we have just been tracing. The southern way, which I am now
describing, is by a path leaving El Plan at the end of the village and
going down to the river (which here runs through a broad valley floor),
across the river by a bridge, and then up the torrent valley of the
Sentina, a little south of east. The path runs on the right or northern
bank of this torrent, and any path or tracks to be seen crossing the
water are not to your purpose. Keep always to the same side of the stream
until you come to the col, which is more than 4 but less than 5 miles
from El Plan and is called the Col de Sahun. From this col the path
continues a little less clearly marked, but quite easy, down the sharp
valley on the further side to the village of Sahun, which lies exactly
due east of the col and just over 3 miles from it. The whole passage,
therefore, from El Plan to Sahun, is a matter of not more than two hours,
and from Sahun to Venasque there is an excellent mule road following up
the open valley of the Esera; a distance of just 4 miles.
By this southern approach the whole distance is but a plain walk of under
20 miles with only one low and easy col to climb, but of course it tells
you far less of what the Pyrenees can be than does the northern passage.
* * * * *
With the valley of the Esera and the town of Venasque you have come to
the end of Sobrarbe, and of all that remote and ill-known district which
is the most savage and the most alluring in these great hills. Indeed,
you are no longer properly in the Sobrarbe, but rather in the subdivision
of Ribagorza, which had a Count to itself in the Middle Ages, and was
the march between Aragon and Catalonia. From Venasque you can get back
again at your ease next day, by one of the best known mule tracks in the
Pyrenees, to the French valleys and to wealth again at Luchon.
[Illustration: THE SOBRARBE]
IV. THE TARBES VALLEYS AND LUCHON
[Illustration]
Three valleys, two profound, one shallow, depend upon and radiate from
the town of Tarbes which stands in the plain below the mountains. Their
rail system and their road system converge upon Tarbes, and it is from
Tarbes that they should be explored.
The two long valleys are the valley of Lourdes, down which flows the Gave
de Pau and the long valley of Arreau or Val d’Aure (it is the longest
enclosed valley of the Pyrenees). The short valley is the valley of
Bigorre, wherein the Adour arises.
For a man on foot these three valleys are of interest chiefly in their
highest portions alone. The energy of French civilization has penetrated
them everywhere with light railways and with roads, and has united them
all three by a great lateral road running from Arreau to Luz over what
used to be the difficult and ill-known port of Tourmalet; while it has
thus done a great deal for those who only use the road, it has hurt the
district from the point of view which I am taking in this division of my
book.
There is indeed one great hill which no development of roads can effect,
and which is the chief interest of all these three valleys for the man
on foot. It rises in the very centre of the district and is called the
Pic du Midi de Begorre. This peak stands thrust forward from the main
range, a matter of more than 10 miles from the watershed, and isolated
upon every side save where the isthmus of the Tourmalet binds it to the
general system not much more than 2000 feet below its summit. But the Pic
du Midi de Begorre, fine as it is, does not afford so many opportunities
to the man exploring the Pyrenees on foot as do other peaks. It is a
bare mountain, all precipice upon the northern side, and steep every
way. There is no camping ground save at the foot of it in the little
wood above Abay. Moreover, there is a road right up it, an observatory
upon the top, and arrangements for sleeping and for eating and drinking
as well. No other of the great mountains of Europe have been put more
thoroughly in harness. The chief use of it (for the purposes of this
book) is that from its summit you will get a better general view of the
eastern Pyrenees than from any other point reached with equal ease,
and that you can see in one view, as you look southward, the Maladetta
on your extreme left, the Pic du Midi d’Ossau on your extreme right,
each about 30 to 40 miles away. It is also a point from which the sharp
demarcation between the mountain and the plain, which characterizes the
northern slope of the Pyrenees, is very clear; for this peak, jutting out
as it does from the mass of the hills, dominates all the flat country
beneath.
The roads of these three valleys are somewhat overrun—even in their upper
portions. That from the end of the light railway from Luz to Gavarnie,
is, in the summer, the only really spoilt piece of the Pyrenees; that
from Arreau up to Vielle Aure in the furthest valley is less frequented,
but there is no particular reason for stopping in it or for camping
in it, especially when one considers the waste spaces on either side,
where one may be wholly remote and at peace. There is, however, in one
branch of this valley, that is in the gulley which runs due south from
Trainzaygues, a good camping ground of woods and stream. A road runs up
it to the refuge of Riomajou at its summit, and from this two difficult
cols can be reached by two branch paths which go over either shoulder
of the Pic d’Ourdissettou, that on the right or west gets one down to
Real and Bielsa; that on the left ultimately and with some difficulty to
Gistain and El Plan. There is also an entry from the main valley into the
Sobrarbe, going up the main valley through Aragnouet, and up the very
steep pass called the Pass de Barroude; one also comes out by this way on
to Real and Bielsa, but it is by the other fork of the Spanish valley.
The pass called the Port de Bielsa proper marks what was once perhaps
the main pass north and south over these hills. It leaves the valley at
Leplan above Aragnouet and stands between the two passes just mentioned.
These and all the difficult ports, springing from the three valleys of
Tarbes and crossing the central part of the range, lead one into the
Sobrarbe and the track described in the last division of this chapter.
The valley of Arreau has an eastern fork following the Louron at the head
of which are further high passes, all in the neighbourhood of 8000 feet,
which lead one into the Posets group and the eastern end of Sobrarbe. Of
these the most interesting is the port of Aiguestoites, which is that
upon which one comes by error if one misses the Col de Gistain on the
northern way from Bielsa to Venasque.
The Cirques—the great semicircles of precipices—which have always been
remarked as distinctive of the Pyrenees, are crowded in this region. The
Cirque de Gavarnie is the most famous, and therefore, in our time at
least, impossible for a man who really wants to wander. You cannot be
alone there; but the Cirque of Troumouse is not hackneyed and should be
seen once at least. You may reach it by taking the road up from Luz to
Gavarnie, and following it as far as Jedre. Here the Gave branches, you
go up the zigzag of the road, past the church of Jedre, and take the path
which leaves the highway to the left and follows up the eastern Gave,
or Gave de Heas on its left bank. The path crosses that stream 2 miles
further on and follows up the right bank to the little hamlet of Heas
(which gives the torrent its name). It continues getting less distinct
past the chapel of Heas; you turn a corner of a rock and find yourself in
this huge, bare, deserted circle of precipices with the Pic de Gerbats at
the left end of it, the Pic of Gabediou at the east end, and in the midst
the highest point, the Pic d’Arrouye, which just misses 10,000 feet.
The path continued will take you up past some cabanes over the little
glacier, and across that steep and very difficult ridge down into the
Spanish valley of Pinède—which ends up, of course, in Bielsa.
But for these ramifications of their higher ravines, the three valleys
of Tarbes are the least suitable for a man travelling on foot; of the
three, however, the Val d’Aure will afford the most variety and the most
isolation.
If, for any reason, one of these three valleys is chosen for a short
holiday, Tarbes—where there is a good hotel, The Ambassadeurs—is the
centre from which one should start and to which one should return; it
faces right at the mountains, it is the most truly Pyrenean town of all
the plain, and it is full of excellent entertainment. From Tarbes also
start the three lines which take you up each valley, to Argelès, to
Bagnères de Bigorre, and to Arreau.
_Luchon_
The valley of Luchon stands by itself as a separate division of the
Pyrenees. It has character altogether its own, formed both by political
accidents, which separate it from its twin valley of the Upper
Garonne—the Val d’Aran—and by its physical conformation which thrusts
the level floor of it up further into the hills than any other of the
Pyrenean gorges. It is indeed made by nature to be one of the great
international roads of Europe and to lead into Spain, for it resembles
in many ways the trench running from Oloron southwards along which the
main Roman road, and the main modern road find their way into Aragon.
The valley of Luchon would undoubtedly have formed the platform for such
a road had not two accidents interfered with that destiny: the first,
the great height of the ridge at the end of this particular valley; the
second, the lack of open country to the south.
The Roman road from Oloron over the Somport finds a wide plain and an
ancient city at Jaca, within a day’s journey of the central summit. But
the valley of the Esera (which is the Spanish valley corresponding to
that of Luchon) is a good three days’ travel in length before it gets one
out of the hills, and the first town of the plains on the Spanish side
(the modern symbol of whose importance is the presence of the railway)
is Barbastro 60 miles in a straight line from the watershed, and not far
short of 90 following the turns of the mule path and lower down the road
which reaches it.
But for these accidents the way through Luchon would undoubtedly be the
great avenue from Toulouse to Saragossa, and even as it is the pass over
the ridge here (called the Port de Venasque) is the most trodden and the
clearest of all the passes, other than those followed by direct highways.
The valley of Luchon is the very centre of the mountain system, for it
lies just east of that division between the two halves of the mountains,
the eastern and the western chains. It is a frontier also between two
types of scenery and two kinds of travel. It is the last of the deep
flat valleys running north and south, which are, so far eastward, the
characteristic of the chain. Immediately beyond it, to the east, begins a
combination of hills of which St. Girons is the capital, and into which
still further east penetrate the much larger valleys of the Ariège and of
the Tet.
The Thermal Springs of Luchon, and a chance popularity which made it the
wealthiest holiday place in all the mountains, have now fixed it as a
sort of central spot which sums up all travel in the Pyrenees. For nearly
a century it has had the character, which continually increases in it, of
great luxury, and of a colony, as it were, of the main towns of Europe.
But, for reasons which I mention when I come to speak of inns and hotels
in these mountains, it is in some way saved from the odiousness which
most cosmopolitan holiday places radiate around them like an evil smell.
The influence of Paris is in some part responsible for better manners and
greater dignity than such tourist places usually show.
The little town is very old; it is probably the site of the Baths which
were mentioned as the most famous of the Pyrenean waters as early as the
first century, and which certainly stood in this country of Comminges.
For Luchon is the modern centre of the Comminges, and the Comminges is
first historical district of the Pyrenees west of the old Roman province.
For a man travelling on foot in the Pyrenees the chief value of Luchon
lies in its being the only rail-head which lies close against the highest
peaks. Here one can have one’s letters sent and one’s luggage, and to
this place one can always return from the wildest parts of the Sobrarbe,
or of Catalonia, which lie on either hand just to the south-west and
south-east. It is also the best place in the whole range in which to
change English money.
The valley, though it has great historical interest (and everybody who
has the leisure should see St. Bertrand at the mouth of it), has, like
those valleys to the west of it which have just been mentioned, little
to arrest a man on foot, except in its last high reach. The ridge which
runs north for 12 miles beyond Luchon and lies west of the railway, is
high and densely wooded; but it is not good camping ground and it leads
nowhere, while that to the east, less steep and not quite so densely
wooded, has but one large field for camping, the forest of Marignac;
and even in Marignac there is nothing but the wood to attract one. Once
through the wood one is back again upon a high road and the valley of the
Garonne.
Above Luchon, however, there spread out a number of valleys which are
worthy of exploration in themselves, and one of which is the main way
over into Spain. For this last we must continue the high road (which
follows up the Pique, the river that waters all the Luchon district)
until one comes, at the end of the causeway, to the hotel that was
formerly a hospice, and is still called by that name. From this point
a steep path takes one 3000 feet right up to the main ridge and to the
little notch in the rock which is called the Port de Venasque. The path,
though not so clear, is equally easy on the other side, bringing one
down into the valley of the Esera and to the town of Venasque in the
Sobrarbe. The whole way from Luchon to Venasque, counting this steep
ridge, is one day’s easy going. There is no way across the central range
more simple or less difficult (though it is high), and it has very fine
views; as one crosses the summit one has right before one culminating
peaks of the Pyrenees, the group of the Maladetta.
Just to the east of the Port de Venasque (which is about 8000 feet
high—to be accurate, 7930) is the Pic de Sauvegarde, a path which
is almost a road leads up to it; one pays a toll; it is a sort of
Piccadilly. The one purpose of the climb is to see from the summit a very
good all-round view of the high peaks, which crowd round this turning
point in the chain.
A less frequented valley, but one quite sufficiently frequented, is that
of the Lys, which one turns into out of the main road by going off to the
right; about 2½ miles after leaving Luchon, a carriage road, 4 miles in
length, takes one up through the woods at Lys to an inn; thence forward
in the lovely valley and the half circle of peaks above, there is country
wild enough for every one, but no good camping ground.