Day 1 Le Puy-en-Velay to Saint Privat-d’Allier

We really dodged a bullet today! Yesterday had been very wet in the morning and the forecast for today was for rain starting about 11am and continuing for the rest of the day – however barely a drop fell and having now seen the trails it would have been awful in the rain!

We got away just after 8am with temperatures around 10C – a bit chilly but as it turned out almost a perfect temperature to walk in.

As we’d come to expect from the Camino del Norte after walking through town (via the Place du Plot, the traditional meeting place for pilgrims) we went virtually straight up, first by road (past the statue of St Jacques) then a wide dirt road and finally medieval rock paths to the little hamlet of La Roche at 871m, a climb of just over 200m over 5 1/2 kms.

From there track turned into bit of a goat trail through paddocks but through some beautiful scenery along a brook that had eroded a very deep valley through the countryside. Across the river we spotted one of the infamous “shit machines” and a bit further up we smelt the results of the farmer’s endeavours!

We stopped a couple of kms further on at Saint-Christoph for our first break and a coffee with some cake we’d bought in Le Puy before continuing through the hamlets of Tallode, Liac and Lic – all reasonably flat and pleasant until we hit a pretty rocky path just after Lic.

So far, the trail is much better signposted than the Camino and the French seem to be putting in the work to make it attractive to walkers – toilets, picnic tables and information signs, none of which we saw on the Camino!

The rocky path eventually lead us out onto the road leading past Ramourouscle and the Chapelle Saint-Roche and then a steeper climb into Montbonnet at 1112m where we had some lunch and a couple of beers for me and coffee for Al.

We thought we had reached today’s peak but after an easy walk out of Montbonnet we started climbing again, sharing the track with some cows before topping out at 1210m near Lac de l’oeuf. The next 5kms or so was an increasingly steep descent dropping down about 300m, first on roads to Le Chier, and then on a really rough track down to where we stay tonight – Saint-Privat-d’Allier.

We’re in a Gite d’Etape (hostel), albeit in a private room, so I’m interested to see how that goes!

Overall a great start through fabulous scenery, even if the clouds made it a bit dull.

25 kms today by my watch!