What It’s Like to Thru-Hike in Europe (It’s Complicated)

in case you're wondering yes that is an actual photo of me from my gr11 through hike that I did back in 2021 eating a completely normal through hiking breakfast so what's this video about well if you like watching a lot of hiking stuff on YouTube then you've seen a lot of people through hiking the PCT the CDT the at and other big through hiking trails in North America so naturally you might think that the through hiking community in Europe isn't that big but that couldn't be further from the truth because there are a lot of people here in Europe that do long-distance hiking and there are a lot of through hikes in Europe that deserve much more attention the wild camping rules in Europe are different for each country and each region so I definitely encourage you to do your own research and I definitely don't want to encourage you to break any rules especially because I'm a YouTuber and I shouldn't encourage you to break any rules at least publicly as far as I know you're legally allowed to Camp pretty much anywhere in Scotland Norway Sweden Finland and Estonia then there are a few countries that allow camping in a lot of areas but not all of them like ltia Lithuania Romania Switzerland and England and unfortunately in the rest of Europe wild camping is banned on paper but in reality most people do it anyway including [Music] me damn that's pretty good when you're wild camping in Europe I would avoid doing it in Natural Parks especially if they're very popular I would set up the tent very late in the evening and take it down early in the morning and also set it up in a somewhat hidden Place having a tent in green or gray colors definitely helps with this also keep in mind that building fires and survival shelters is prohibited in pretty much most of Europe and if you do that you're more likely to get a big fine and one last thing that I wanted to mention about wild camping in Europe is animal the mountains here are usually filled with sheep goat cows horses and other animals that the farmers usually come to check up every day this means that 50% of the time you're sleeping eating or sitting in animal I'm actually probably sitting in animal right now in Spain Italy and France the mountains are filled with free Mountain Huts that most locals prefer to stay in over building their own tent they're called refugios or something like that depending on which country you're in and they're usually an Old Farmer's house that's cleared out maybe there's a table there a few bong beds and anyone can stay there for free to give you context while through hiking the gr11 for 36 days I passed by maybe 50 or more of these free Mountain Huts that said always be prepared that not all of them will be open not all of them will be always free and not all of them are in a good enough condition to sleep in I person personally prefer to pitch up my own tent and do wild camping but staying in a fugio can be a very good way to meet with some of the local hikers in the area and also you don't have to worry about any wild camping rules generally I found out that I'm not using my water filter nearly as much when I'm hiking in Italy or Spain that's because there are a lot of free flowing water tabs called fonts if you're passing through a city even a smaller one chances are that it has one two or three of these fonts where you can get free drinking water they're also scattered across the mountains to use for farm animals that said I would still recommend you to bring a water filter because the water isn't always drinkable from these fonts and sometimes they run dry in regards to food you won't find nearly as much processed foods in the smaller shops when you're resupplying so if you're trying to resupply in a small town chances are that there won't be any dried meals or similar products instead you usually have to Mi your own dinners I actually have an upcoming video about lightweight hiking recipes that are good for your health so keep an eye out for that there's also a much lower selection of nuts dried fruit bars candy and so on one meal that you can find in pretty much any local small store is a baguette filled with a lot of cheese I ate this big baguette every morning because you could make it very easily it's very tasty it has a lot of fat and a lot of calories in most of Europe except for Romania and north of Scandinavian countries there isn't really any danger of be attacks there are only a few Bears scattered across the rest of Europe and usually you don't have to worry about them because they're very shy and chances that you'll encounter one are extremely slim but there are a few other dangers though like wild boes and Shepherd's dogs in general wild BS are pretty safe they usually run away from you but if you encounter them on a trail close by if you scare them and they're with their newborn babies the mother will probably attack you they have very sharp teeth they weigh a few hundred kilos and a wild Bo attack can sometimes even be fatal and if you keep leaving food in your tent then it's probably only a matter of time until a pack of wild boar try to get in during the night so to avoid this encounter you have to hang your food in a tree similar to what you do in North America in be country at least 50 m away from your tent since I started doing this I haven't had any encounters with wild boar you also have to watch out for Shepherd dogs especially the big white ones a lot of farmers here don't really care about other hikers mountain bikers and other people that are in the mountains so they use aggressive and untrained dogs to hurt their sheep sometimes you'll have to take a pretty big detour by going through Bush or some hills to avoid a pack of animals that are left alone with five or six of these big AGG aggressive Shepherd dogs most of the time though they're very friendly and cute but some of them are aggressive and you have to watch out for that if you meet an aggressive shepherd's dog do not be aggressive towards him speak calmly do not face in the other direction and slowly back away do not do any sudden movements and do not show any fear and you'll probably be fine be prepared that unless you're hiking in England obviously nobody will understand English people here sometimes even have a negative attitude when you start speaking to them in English especially in Italy Spain and France if you're throughing in Europe especially in these three countries I would say that it's pretty much mandatory to learn at least a few phrases to be able to resupply and to talk to other people but overall though most people here are very open and friendly it's just that it's a bit hard to communicate with them if you don't understand the language there definitely are quite a few European countries that could be considered quite expensive but even though that's the case you can still do it on a very low budget if you're very conscious about where you spend your money for example if you don't stay in any hotels Mountain Huts don't eat out in any restaurants cafes un limit the nights that you spend in campsites and do more wild camping and cook your own food then probably the cost won't be too high for example me personally I spent a bit below €1,000 to do a 36 day through hike in nor more than Spain and that includes all the train tickets and plane tickets as well I've personally done a lot of research on different through hikes in Europe because together with my wife we make posters of various through hikes across the world and to do this we need to do a lot of research on which of these trails are the most popular ones on a side note if you want to check them out go to Trail goals.com and by entering the code Oscar hikes you'll get 10% off anyway here's a list of some of the most popular through hikes in Europe in Spain Portugal and France the most popular through hike definitely is Camino de Santiago which actually consists of many different roots that grow all across these countries in Portugal there's also rot ventina which is a very popular Coastal through hike in Spain and France there's gr11 which I did gr10 and hrp which all basically cross the Pyrenees Mountain Range sideways gr11 mostly goes through Spain gr10 mostly through France and the hrp goes somewhere in the middle through both of these countries but it goes higher in elevation and it's in general a more remote Trail there's also really popular through height called the gr20 which goes across the French owned Cara Island moving on to the Alps there are actually quite a lot of options like the Walker's hot route the Via Alpena 1 and the Via Alpena 2 the Alp Adra Trail the toront Blanc which everyone knows the gr5 trods and the Via Alpena Trails the only downside to hiking in the Alps is that it's much much more popular there more people through hike there and you're more likely to get caught if you're wild camping Germany is a completely different Beast because it's littered with many through hiking trails like the ren St the rain St RAR St the Apel St and many many others and I know that I'm butchering all of these names other notable trails in Europe include the pad that goes through the Netherlands the Via r Fran which goes from the UK to Rome and the Via transilvanica trail that goes across Romania the UK just like Germany also has an extremely large through hiking community and some of their most popular Trails include the West Highland Way the Southwest coast Trail the panine way the Ridgeway Trail and many others up in the north you'll find the kungen and the padel which both go through Sweden and Al the long Leen Crossing which I did which isn't really that popular but I think it deserves a spot here just because of how beautiful this Trail is I remember that these trails are just the most popular ones in Europe there are also way way more through hikes in Europe that are less known maybe less well marked but also extremely beautiful and should be on anyone's bucket list thank you for watching I hope you enjoyed this video and I'll see you next time bye

Channel: Oscar Hikes

Views: 111,994

Keywords: thru-hiking Europe, long distance hiking europe, europe thru hikes, hiking in europe, camino de santiago, via francigena, west highland way, gr20, pieterpad, gr5, camino frances, camino del norte, gr10, rennsteig, south west coast trail, camino portugues, camino primitivo, camino ingles, pennine way, thru hiking in UK, thru-hiking in spain, thru-hiking in france, thru-hiking in germany

Id: EtKJclga8GM

Length: 10min 26sec (626 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 17 2024