Planning the GR5 walk.

by Jim Benthuysen

Its November 2011. I have been developing this trip for almost a year. I love planning travel and this is  the big one indeed.
First I decided to use available resources - the David May website in links is the perfect starting point and a wealth of material is mentioned and multiple guide books and maps are referenced.
I also discovered obtained 2 books that were no longer in print but available out there used:

Walking Europe From Top To Bottom - A Sierra Club Travel Guide - by S. Margois and G. Harmon -1986
A Long Walk South  - Sean Rothery -2002

These were invaluable first hand English language accounts of through-hiking the GR5. They described an itinerary and logistics which gave me a huge advantage in my own planning. But I also had planning resources which they lacked. The Internet is simply amazing in this regard. Using an electronic calender, you can rough out the itinerary and then research prospective lodging for the night, record the contact information even the websites for rapid access.

In my readings of the trip, it became clear that getting lost was major problem for these earlier walkers. Their maps ( which are amazingly expensive and heavy ) as well as French language guidebooks (heavy too) did not always keep them on course in the deep woods amongst a maze of trails.
I also found that several of the French guidebooks are outdated and new editions are pending.

I also discovered that while the GR5 and most of these European GR routes are basically unknown in the US, they are a big deal to the Europeans so I discovered quite a few websites which I could use via google translate :

http://translate.google.com/#

This website has been incredibly useful to view websites in English as well  translate lodging communications via email. You simple type text of copy the website URL into the right side. adjust the language sliders and the website opens in English (or whatever you want).

Among the various websites are those with specific GR5 gps info such as

http://www.gpsies.com
and
http://www.gr5.info/wayp.html

Downloading these gps way points I am able to view huge parts of the route on the free Google Earth program. On finding this I immediately realized the advantage this gives the walker in both planning and hopefully walking the route.

Owning a Garmin Etrex  (nice birthday present Tammy!), I found that there were commercial Garmin gps topomaps available specifically Benelux (Belgium Luxembourg) and France. Obtaining them, I found they chart the GR5 and everything else I could want!  I hope I have solved the expensive heavy map problem using my gps.

In addition, I can plan by bring up the topomaps and google earth simultaneously in separate screens and minutely creep through the route using google to zoom up and inspect the details. I can also measure the distances by tracing the route on Google Earth.

Having done this for some time (all year)  and rereading what the previous authors described for daily segments, I feel I have been able to refine our day to day schedule. Also there exist a few places where there are route options - shortcuts which I can place into the Etrex as literal rainy day options to get to the day's destination quicker on some long days. In general I have most of the days broken into 12-14 mile days with the occasional 18 miler.

This raises the question that if we use the shortcut are we no longer doing the GR5? We've decided that while we aren't going to pretend to be purists, we will stick to the route to the greatest extent possible.
If something doesn't make sense or we aren't having fun - we'll exercise judgement accordingly. We want to give it a shot. We hope our bodies hold up. On that note, I've booked weekly rest days into the plan.

On reading the other authors descriptions another thing that stood out was the fact that the Netherlands is flat and much of the walking was on paved bike routes. Having experienced the sore feet this leads to ourselves and mentioned by the referenced authors it occured to us that biking the Netherlands would be a good way to do this part. Which subsequently opens the possibility of seeing way more of the Netherlands than we could on foot. And in May during peak tulip season! This has evolved into a prequel to the walk- 11 days of cycling from the central Holland town of Zwolle to our start at Bergen Op Zoom. ( In years past it turns out BOZ was once the begining of the GR5 which has since been extended to Hook Van Holland. We are peddling this segment as well). With Tulip's help I have developed a custom bike tour which they are finalizing now.

This trip is just a blast to plan!