Pilgrim's Progress – Long Distance Walks in Europe and the UK

We are all pilgrims in search of the unknown.

Paul Coelho

The train journey from Montauban to Arles ( my point of departurr for Chemin d’Arles) didn’y get off to the best of starts. It was only when the doors closed of the train which pulled out of platform 1 at 14.10 that I realised that I’d boarded the wrong train! The intercity train to Arles which I had booked was 20 minutes late. I had inadvertently boarded a slow commuter train which was due to stop at every station between Montauban and Toulouse! What a disaster! And the walk hadn’t even begun!

Thankfully disaster was averted as I managed to disembark at Toulouse, rush to the next platform and board my original teain for Arles which appeared at the station barely a minute later! Somebody up there was smiling on me!

The campsite I’d booked in Arles wasn’t ideal – it was 2km out of town and situation next to a busy highway and a railway line. This might explain why not many people were staying there and why the cost of an overnight stay at the ‘Campibg d’Arlesienne’ in a one msn tent had been slashed from €30 to €20!

It was an early rise (5am) as I had an appointment with a Monsieur Débard who had promised to give me an orientation session about the ‘Chemin d’Arles’ if I could get to his house on the outskirts of Arles by 7am.

As I left the campsite I noticed a sign. ‘Its not your age that matters, it’s you’ it said. A few months before my sixtieth birthday, were they talking to me?

I’d hoped that Monsieur Débard might be able to give me a list of pilgrim host families en route similar to those I’d met on the Via Francigena two years ago. Sadly it seems that no such list exists. So instead I had to content myself with a cookie, a cup of coffee and some well meaning advice – always head west, Monsieur Débard advised me, that way you won’t get lost.

Monsieur Débard advised me to make a diversion from the official route and instead head west along a dyke just outside his house. Only 5 pilgrims had visited him this year, so I wasn’t entirely sure about his credentials. But he seemed a well meaning chap, so I decided to follow his advice and head off along the dyke. It was barely 8am and I had a long day ahead of me.

The scenery wasn’t the most stupendous I’d seen. Miles upon miles of rice fields, irrigated from the waters of the River Rhone. The walking was fairly easy, it was difficult to get lost and by midday I’d made it to St Gilles du Gard, the destination of the 4th most popular pilgrimmage ( after Compostella, Rome and Jerusalem) during the Middle Ages.

Comemorating St Giles, an obscure early Christian saint who founded an abbey nearby after being wounded by a 6th century king of the Visigoths whole he was trying to protect a deer he was sharing a cave with, the Abbey of St Gilles du Gard proved a tad underwhelming.

Most of the afternoon was spent walking along canals and through vineyards under a broiling sun. I must have drunk nearly 4 litres of water, and when I exhausted my water supplies and was beginning to flag, I was forced to quench my thirst with grapes from the vines I passed. They were a godsend.

Having walked 40km in the day, I arrived in Vauvert shortly after 4pm and made my way to the ‘Patio du Chemin’ Gite d’Étape in the centre of town.

Bea Péyric, the proprietess of the gite couldn’t have been more welcoming. Myself and 3 other pilgrims were greeted with an apero of sangria before we all settled down to a delicious 3 course meal including roast bull, which was new to me but is apparently a speciality of the Camargue.

Two years ago Bea moved from Britany ( where she had lived for 25 years) to live in Vauvert. She wanted to be closer to her family but she also wanted to follow her dream of setting up a Gite and hosting pilgrims walking the Chemin d’Arles.

Over supper Bea recounted some of the fascinating people she had met over the past couple of years from all four corners of the world. She obviously loves sharing her hospitality with complete strangers and it was a delight to enjoy her company in such convivial surroundings.

Having chatted away in French for the best part of 3 hours with my fellow guests, it was time to head off to bed before another 30km day tomorrow. Thankfully tonight there is no need for earplugs or a 5am alarm call on the morrow!