The
bordermarkers of the Pyrenees : all my trips
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14 may
2012 -
Bm408-III and IV unfindable
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esfr-trip-track-20120514.kml
(click to open this trip
in Google
Earth or copy link to Google Maps; click right on this
link to download gpx-version)
Summary: part of a 6-days trip - accompanied by Jan-Willem Doomen- with
daytrip-targets in the Basque country, near Fos and around Puigcerda.
Day 3: from Fos a trip to Cabane to Hérechet and beyond, main target being an new search for bm408-III and 408-IV.
Weather: clear skies, sunny
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For
explanation of
the gps-coordinates and other cartographic backgrounds:
see my cartography page
En route: 8-18 (10h)
According to the gps-tripteller:
Distance: 14,6 km
Cum. elevation gain: 1367m
Total elevation: 2734m
Maximum height: 1677m
Time: 9.38h
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According
to visugpx
- distance: 11,8 km
- cum. elevation gain: 1345m
- cum. elevation loss: 1339m
- total elevation: 2684m
- altitude maxi: 1678m
- altitude mini: 557m
- altitude average: 1162m
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From the electricity-building at the foot of the hills, we climb in 1 ½ h to Cabane de Hérechet along a well path.
In between - looking back - this view of Fos.
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The Cabane de Hérechet is well maintained and clean and there's a water-supply.
After a coffee-break, I explore for a while the terrain south of the
cabane using my gps with waypoints of my theoretical guesses of
bm408-IV and 408-III.
A stream springs in this area but I can't find any bordermarker.
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Then we hike up the path which starts behind the cabane.
It's now waymarked with cairns (it wasn't in september 2011).
Jan-Willem spots this mysterious sign alongside the trail.
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This trail doesn't bend to the cascade with bm400-I and II as
I expected it would do.
Actually there's at one point (where two trees
have a double red stripes) a branch going left to the cascade. This picture shows that point.
The double stripes puzzle me. I'm used in this region to double red
stripes on trees,
marking the esfr-borderline in forests. But here we are definitely not
on the esfr-border and the double stripes here might only indicate the
border
between two forestry parcels.
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When we climb further west along the
cairned path, we spot more double red stripes.
I wonder if this trail will bring us at the border-ridge but at some point the trail and cairns vanish (or we lost them).
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Then we climb
directly SW to the borderridge, first through forest and then on the
bare mountain-slope with this view in the direction of Melles.
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The last part is tough.
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Then we descend along the borderridge to bm407.
This picture: a zoom-in to the mountain at the other side of the Garonne. See the last picture of this page for the borderline.
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It's a marvellous day with breath-taking vistas
(photo by Jan-Willem)
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We approach bm407, visible in the far distance.
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Zoom-in of bm407
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Bm407
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Bm407, backside with the old bordermarker in front,
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with the remains of an arm on its side.
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Further on - where the ridge flattens and after the pine trees - , go
left (east) and descend into the forest and after ± 125m you will spot
bm408.
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But Jan-Willem keeps his eye for nature: "All things bright and beautiful, all creatures great and small".
(photo by Jan-Willem)
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While I keep focussed on my beloved bordermarkers.
This picture: descending to bm408, I create a cairn to help ... maybe you?
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Bm408 visible in te distance.
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Bm408
From bm408 to bm408-I is a difficult search on a steep wooded hillside.
The gps is here - in a forest on steep terrain - of limited value. Your
ears are as much important in finding the little stream/cascade which
springs just underneath bm408-I
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Bm408-I
From bm408-I, I walk back to bm408 which is again not a straightforward
route, neither when returning again to bm408-I. But the best route
between those markers gets more clear.
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My directions: from bm408 go a bit N (say 20m), there you are able to descend E down the hillside.
Descend considerably (±
70m in altitude) to the E, then go N on approximately the same level
for ± 125m until you see bm408-I and/or hear the stream.
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Bm408-I
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From bm408-I along the stream to 408-II and further to the bottom of
the cascade is a difficult task, clinging from one tree to another.
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Bm408-II
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Bm408-II, looking to cascade.
At the bottom, the stream disappears in a fern-field, not to re-emerge
again along the relatively 'open' strip in the forest descending NEE to
where it gets (too) steep.
There's no trace of a bm408-III or IV. They
remain a mystery. Have they disappeared or are we looking in the wrong
place?
We climb back for a while, then traverse through the forest to the
trail from cascade to cabane.
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From the cabane this panorama to the SE.
Then back to
the car and the camping municipal in Fos. On our way down, I meet a local
shepherd or likewise who doesn't know anything of the 408-submarkers.
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