Getting There

This guide is about our trip from Barcelona, I traveled from Leeds-Bradford with Jet2, and James from Gatwick with Easyjet. Doing it from Barcelona means you can enjoy the best of both worlds, and it still seems like a holiday.

Getting Around

There are trains in Spain, but not many, the only ones we really used were getting from the Airport to the City centre. Buses were our weapon of choice, we caught the following:

Getting to Torla:

13.00 Barcelona (Sants Estascio, just outside the train station) to Huesca, check times

20.30 Huesca to Sabinanigo, check times

Camped at Sabinanigo* then

11.00 Sabinanigo to Torla

*The Campsite at Sabinanigo is on the north edge of town. Basically from the bus station, go back towards the round about and turn left and carry on past the garages with the funny ledged road. And its at the end of the road, just over the E-7 main road.

When we arrived started walking (see day 1)

Getting back to Barcelona from Benasque

06.45 Benasque (Bus shelter on the South entrance to the town, near the Tourist information Centre) to Barbastro, check times

10.20 Barbastro to Barcelona, check times

Please note, the links are for the dates we traveled, check them for your own dates especially as buses are rare on Sundays.

The GR11

The route we took can be testing, steep climbs, scree (both climbs and decent's), sheer climbs with chains to hold onto. Water crossings, ledge walking etc. The route is well marked, at times though we did lose the path, especially through rock parts, and have to make some adjustments. The markings consist of red and white painted strips of the rocks, piles of rocks, short posts and some (rare) signposts. You can't get majority lost, but a map and compass should always be to hand.

Dangerous points to look out for are:

Day 1 - The Rincon de Soaso, climbing out of the gorge, chains are in place to help
Day 2 - The track via Mallos de lacey, 2km to the East of Goriz, climbing down through a waterfall, chains in place
Day 2 -Decent into Valle de Pineta, very irritating and long decent over scree, however beautiful stream at the end to cool your sore feet.
Day 6 - Crossing the Stream at Llardaneta 1km North of Refugio Angel Orus, we couldn't find a bridge and is a jump of faith, recommend using para cord and not crossing with packs, the water was high when we did it.

We say dangerous, but we survived and many others have as well, just be cautious.

Our Route

Click here to see a larger version

Walking West to East, route taken from the Lonely Planet Guide to Walking in Spain, although the books route goes from East to West and our route is only part of it. Also the names and stops on the map links below don't always match those of the actual walking maps.

Day 1 - Torla to Refugio de Goriz

Day 2 - Refugio de Goriz to Refugio de Larri

Day 3 - Refugio de Larri to Parzan

Day 4 - Parzan to Refugio de Biados

Day 5 - Refugio de Biados to Refugio de Estos

Day 6 - Refugio de Estos to Refugio Angel Orus

Day 7 - Refugio Angel Orus to Benasque Camping Aneto