15th of August the loud music of the festival stopped by five o’clock in the morning. So we were still sleepy at breakfast. Robert had found two Dutch bikers to talk to. Yvonne and her husband who biked all the way from Utrecht. They were not sure if they could make the pass to Roncesvalles with their batteries because it was a climb of more than up to 1.000m of altitude. So they started early to avoid the heat.
We were fairly early for our standards to start and say goodbye to Janis from the pilgrim hostel and get out of town just after sunrise. Her name gave me a new tune in my head: no not “Lord won’t you buy me a Mercedes Benz” – but “Me and Bobby Mc Gee”.
The landscape was beautifully covered with fresh morning dew and the fog in the valleys melted in the first sunrays. We had a steady climb uphill and followed the bike trail beside the main roads, which was supposed to be also for the pilgrim hikers, but seemed not be very taken. We only met one family in the beginning. The higher we got the more the sun had a chance to catch us. So we were happy to change the valley side to get into the shade of the mountains. What we didn’t know in the beginning was the fact that we were on our last French kilometres after we had been biking more than 1.400 km only through France.
From now on there will be less and less “Bonjour” along the way. This “Bonjour” has been the habit already since the French speaking part of Switzerland exactly a month ago. It is really funny to observe people saying “Bonjour” because it is quite an effort for their lips compared to “Hi”. It starts with the round shape of an “o” for “Bon“ and ends even with a more intense gesture to purse the lips for the “-jour”. At the end it looks like all form their lips to give you a kiss in the air.
So that’s what we were doing crossing a little bridge over to Spain: A flying kiss into the air to goodbye France with all the wonderful times and experiences we were able to make there. “Merci beaucoup” and “Buenos Dias” to Spain. We crossed the border at Lucaide/Valcarlos and actually we were not really changing the cultural heritage, because still the Basque culture connected this area around the Pyrenees over the country borders. You still could see in each village the Pelota walls called Frontón which is a typical Basque game and supposed to be the fastest team ball game in the world.
From now on we had to take the main road and we were lucky that in France it was a holiday today and no big trucks were using the pass. As it was fairly early you could even see a fawn on the road. We climbed higher and higher and with the time the traffic intensified, but heard one noise we didn’t expect. The two stroke engine of a holder driven by Thomas from Munich who had travelled all the way to a biker meeting in Faro since May 7th and was now on his way back with his cabin pulled behind. He had to turn off the engine to be able to talk to me and joked about our concept of “Less-is-More-Tour”, as he saw all the gear we were travelling with through Europe on our bikes. Don’t ask what he pulled as crazy things like TV, shower and all different kind of other equipment in his vehicle cabin.
To start the engine he asked me to push the button at the front of his motorblock and right in this moment my bike and I disappeared in a black cloud. What an experience.
You can have a look at his adventure on this video-link: Thomas During on his Holder
We made it quicker to the pass than expected and were already up on top before noon. We saw several people with flags climbing up to a stele on the pass and had no idea what this demonstration was about. From now on we enjoyed the downhill to the hospice of Roncesvalles, which was not far away anymore. We got there by noon, but the check-in would be by 1:00 o’clock. So we had lunch on a terrace from where we could see even more of these demonstrators.
It was exactly on 15th of August 778 that the Basques population fought the army of Charlemagne at Roncesvalles as a revenge for him destroying the city of Pamplona. They even killed the count Roland, who later got to be one of the first martyrs for France for the crusades. His horn is still lying today in Santiago de Compostela. This date marks somehow the initialization of the Basques identity. So today they still showed their pride at this place.
After one o’clock we were able to check in, but it needed at first a paper to be filled out and then an online form to submit to receive a QR-code. Everything very complicated, but we made it. We still had to wait until 2 o’clock until we could get to our beds. Time to get help from a Dutch team which was doing voluntary work for the pilgrims. They showed us around where to put the bikes, where to wash and where to find the dormitory. We also had time to talk with pilgrims from Glauchau in Germany, Lisa and Flori who had walked all the way until here.
The dormitory had on each floor a capacity for nearly hundred persons. There was enough time to take a shower and even sit down in the recreation room to work on my Blog. Robert took a nap and slept like a rock although people were unpacking their stuff around him. Before we had dinner at 7:00 we still had a look at the museum and the pilgrims mass. Everything was different from now on. As we had travelled all by ourselves for the last six weeks we suddenly were amongst pilgrims from all over the world. At the dinner table people joined from Argentina, South Africa, Australia, USA, France, Spain, Netherlands and Germany. It was a very intense experience. We were afraid of not being able to sleep in the dormitory, but I was with my earplugs already gone before they even switched of the light at 10:00 o’clock. Buenas Noches!
