GR11 - Another day of rest

I just couldn't haul my body out of bed when the alarm went off. I was so tired and totally sapped of all energy. I tried to get out of bed, but the pillow insisted on dragging me back. Much to Peter's disgust, we decided to take a day of rest. He was more than annoyed that he spent all that time and effort yesterday getting us some food for today. He would have been more than annoyed if we had set off and I had dragged my butt like yesterday, as the next stage is a long hard one. He finally got over it and got a chance to watch the entire 120 plus km of the Tour de France, so that put him back in better spirits. I think I'm starting a cold. I hope not. Will see.

Hasta luego!

GR11 - Day 35 - to Puigcerda

The way to the Refugi de Malniu seemed really long to me. I didn't expect it to be so steep in crumbly rock. I'm glad we didn't do it yesterday. From the Refugi, on the left, the landscape went up to a low ridge, in the middle, down to the valley. We left, following the red/white signs, which led us up the ridge, where, all of a sudden we could only see stone cairns, no more signs. Why use the GPS? The trail is so obvious... We had to come back down and finally get on the right trail. We made a pit stop at the Refugi de Malniu where we had a lukewarm instant coffee and toast. After that, the first part of the trail was really nice until we hit the tocky trails once again. I was low on energy. I dragged my butt, getting on Peter's nerves. We stopped at the pueblo of Guils de Cerdanya for a beer. I also had an orange juice and an omelet. That finally perked me up and we kept on to Puigcerda. It took about 7h15. We're really starting to feel the heat of the sun now. We found a cheap hotel and Peter went looking for a grocery store as I did laundry. He came back empty-handed. The town is celebrating its annual 4-day Fiesta del Roser. It celebrates la Virgen del Roser, the patron of Puigcerda. It went on from Friday to Monday, inclusive, and every store is closed... Are we surprised? This is Spain after all... Our guidebook stated that the next town, Age, had a store, so off he went in 30 degree heat. He said that it took over 15 minutes to find a living soul who told him that the store was now permanently closed. He came back to town and found a sandwich shop where they sell bocadillos (like subs), so that will have to be our food for tomorrow.

GR11 - Day 34 - to Refugi de Engorgs

Got off to an early start. We walked through green meadow after green meadow. We reached the Cabana dels Esparvers in decent time. Then the fun began... We had a stream crossing where the two large stones I had to step on were a bit far apart. Peter always gives me a hand in those cases. So here I am with a foot on one stone, holding Peter's hand. Don't I slip off the rock into the creek, mid-calf, and to make matters worse, I lose my balance and fall backwards into the creek, dragging Peter with me. Peter came out relatively unscathed. His walking pole floated down the creek a way, but we were able to fetch it. I was completely soaked. I emptied my boots of water, wrung out my socks and kept on going. I was frozen stiff. All wet at 4 degrees Celsius isn't the best. When we reached the pass, the sun was shining so we took a break and I took the stuff out of my pack to see what the damage was. My sleeping bag was a bit wet as was my Therma-rest and my fleece leggings. Not bad. I dried out a bit and we kept going down some pretty steep gravelly slippery trail down to the bottom of the valley. We were supposed to encounter the Refugi de Engorgs about 1 hr after the pass, but it never seemed to appear. We walked and walked, following the red/white marks all the way until we came to a stream crossing. Be damned if it wasn't the same creek where I fell in in the morning. Somewhere, somehow, we did a U-turn and came back on our steps!! Over 5 hrs of walking and climbing for nothing. Oh boy! Now we have to climb 600 m to the pass all over again, go down the steep slippery path all over again. This time Peter had strict orders to look at the bloody GPS. He ever only looks at it when he checks the altitude. Not only that, he had noticed that we were going backwards. He ignored it and thought he had made an error entering the data. We did finally make it to the Refugi de Engorgs after 9h30. Our destination had been the Refugi de Malniu, but we couldn't fathom another 2h30 so we stayed put. The Refugi is filthy but at least it has nice thick mattresses. We were the only occupants contrary to yesterday where the place was crawling with people.

GR11 - Day 33 - to Refugi de l'Illa

Got off to an early start. It was freezing cold. My fingers were numb holding my walking stick. We got up to the Estany (lake) de Engolasters in good time in spite of Peter not feeling good. From there, it was like walking on a 4-lane highway. The trail is so groomed. It is wide and actually has a railing on the steep drop-off side. When it eventually turned to stone, you would have thought it was a Roman Calzada. In some spots, they filled in with rough cement so that your shoes would have a grab. I was expecting it to be more scenic because it is apparently the only part of Andorra that doesn't have a road. What was really nice were the green meadows that we encountered every now and again. We arrived at the Refugi de l'Illa in 6h20. It is an unmanned refugio and the bed platforms are out of perforated metal (without mattresses). Not too inviting but it will have to do. Peter blew up our mattresses in no time flat and crawled into his sleeping bag. Hopefully he will feel better tomorrow. There was actually a broom in the refugio, so I did some cleaning. It sure needed it.