The bordermarkers of the Pyrenees : all my trips
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- 4 april 2009 -
Hole in many

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 esfr-trip-track-20090404.kml
(click to open in Google Earth or copy link to Google Maps;
click right on this link to download gpx-version
)

It's a lot brighter then yesterday and we're enjoying many beautiful sights on this stretch from say 'les trois fontaines' via La Rhûne to Col de Lizuniaga. Thats where we stop to camp, a bit into France.
Nice day, easier then yesterday.


Weather: a bit cloudy in the beginning, sunny and warm in the afternoon, finally on our camping-spot rainy now and then. 
For explanation of the gps-coordinates and other cartographic backgrounds:
see my cartography page

According to my watch:
Underway:  6.41 hours (9.30 - 16.15), up 538m, down 993m, in total 1531m deniv.

According to visugpx
- distance : 9.52 km
- cum. elevation gain : 382 m
- cum. elevation loss : 822 m
- total elevation:  1204

- altitude maxi : 883 m
- altitude mini : 159 m
- altitude average : 522 m
We walked from our camping-spot back to

Bm023

Unlike yesterday, La Rhûne is now visible.
As you also can see on this picture.  The next marker is about half way up the mountain.
On my way up, I came across this  commemorative plate for an unnamed person from his friends. His motto was "be free like the wind".
You can climb directly - more or less - to

Bm024
I'm looking back at the Petite Rhûne, the humpback you see at the hillridge.  According to the map there's a "borne" (=marker) on it's summit. It is in fact a big cairn, as I discovered later on Google Earth.

"Borne" is a more general indication of markers like cairns or pillar-like monuments but share (on the new digitalized French 25K maps) the same square symbol with bordermarkers.  Bordermarkers are usually indicated with "Borne frontière".
By semi- encircling La Rhûne underneath the summit to the left, I reach a path that ends higher up at the little train-station to the North of  La Rhûne.
Jan-Willem took the roads on the other side of the mountain and on the top we met again.
Watch the yellow line, that's the borderline,  as someone pointed out. On the Spanish side the "venta's", the shops with cheap tabacco  & alcohol.

We take an early lunch with coffee and warm chorizo-sandwhiches

Monument, remembering the visit of a French queen in the 19th century.
We continue to

 Bm025,  the stone seems quite new and are made out of reddish stone.

Yesterday, we saw our first marker of this type:  bm021
Bm026, the venta's of La Rhûne still in the background.

Wat strikes: usually the number on the esfr-borderstones is placed in the direction of the next marker. But now we are looking back.
And peculiar, the hole in these new-looking bordermarkers.

In 2011 I learn from Charles Darrieu that these  holes were drilled at purpose for a metal pole  to facilitate the  placement of the markers..

Bm027

Now the number is placed on the side of the bm and the hole in in the line of border.

We meet a French couple who are photographing bordermarkers and started in Hendaye, like we did.

A little stream is starting here, leading to Bm028.
Bm028

We are following  a yellow-white waymarked path.
Bm028, looking back up the hill.
Descending along the yellow-white patht to the hill-'saddle' with

Bm029

Bm029, looking back to La Rhûne.

From here, we choose the wrong direction (south-east) on what seems the border-ridge.

The couple from bm027 shows us the way (south-south-west).  We find again the yellow-white waymarks (until bm032).
Descending to

Bm030, we find a new stone, split in two, and an old one.

We'll see this a few times again: an new marker with the old one lying besides it.
The left half of the new bm030.

And the right half.
And the old bm030.
Jan-Willem is shocked, what has happened here?
And a last picture of this trinity.
Following the path downwards to

Bm031
With its predecessor in the grass.
Descending to a sort of pass:

Bm032

Note: now a number in the direction of the border ánd the hole in the same side.  Apparently there's no system in this.

Bm032, we're looking back, the old stone is lying nearby.
The old bm032
Continuing on the up- and downgoing hillridge to:

Bm033


The old bm033
And the new bm033.

Same type of reddish stone but a different typography of the number and no hole.
Bm034
Bm035

If you walk straight on from here on a trail downwards, you end up on a country road which leads to a tarmac road near a restaurant.
To the left on this tarmac road and you will reach the bordercrossing.
with on the right besides the road this stone table (mentioned in the Procès-Verbal) with

Bm036
Bm036, looking back at the road.

You can see another stone, to the left, with a cross. We have no information on this stone.
Following the road into France for about 10 minutes, we spot a field higher up to the left where we can camp for the night

(N43 17 06.8 W1 37 22.0)
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