After four challenging days of hiking going up and over the Swiss Alps, meandering through lots of Swiss and Italian villages, we have arrived in our first big city in Italy, the quant town of Aosta with a population of over 125,000 people. The big attractions are a Roman bridge, Roman theater, Roman wall, Roman crypt, and an 11 century cathedral. Check out our YouTube video to see Aosta. It’s our first glimpse of what is to come as we walk to Rome. Can you feel the excitement? It’s there I promise, I’m just tired.
We wandered the old town some, wanted to enjoy much more of the city but our calves are screaming at us. Getting out of bed this morning was frightening. Honestly I didn’t know how well I would make it to the bathroom because it hurt to stand up. Don’t worry, I made it successfully! Haha! By 10 a.m. our legs are feeling more normal.
I am sure the nice stretch our calves got on the way up the mountain helped us but right now we are tired. Therefore, keeping our “we’re on pilgrimage while on holiday” philosophy, we are taking an unplanned but welcome rest day.
Let me take you back to how this worked out. We stopped in Aosta for lunch but the original plan was to continue to the village of Nus. I have no idea why we weren’t stopping for the night in Aosta. I was probably more focused on being frugal. However, just like in my first blog, click here, you know we pivot well if we need to because of weather, circumstances, or our bodies tell us to slow down.
At lunch we had the realization we better check for food options in Nus because it’s a Monday. I haven’t mentioned this yet but a lot of places are closed on either a Sunday or Monday. We look ahead and sure enough, all of the restaurants in Nus were closed when we were planning to walk into town. Ugh, click here to read about the food issues this pilgrimage is already bringing up.
Here we go, time to pivot. We cancel our accommodation, unfortunately with a loss of €45, and booked a fabulous little B&B right on the plaza. By the way, the B&B has two rooms, pay the €5 extra and get the bigger room. We didn’t and the trash/street cleaning trucks made it feel like an earthquake erupted four times in the 6 a.m. hour. The other room had windows off the plaza and I’m going to assume it was quieter.
Hallelujah a rest day! We bus ahead to the village of Saint Vincent which is known for it’s thermal baths. We stay in a hotel with a pool and we have scheduled massages. I can’t tell you how happy this makes both of us. We are just at the beginning of this pilgrimage and we need to be kind to our bodies because we are asking a lot of them.
Check out our YouTube video from Aosta to Saint Vincent.
Stats walking from Echevennoz to Aosta – 14.46 km
- Lodging at Maison Boch — €86
Stats from Aosta to Saint Vincent – we went by bus skipping 32 km on the Via Francigana for a rest day
- Bus – €5.80
- Pool time and massages and worth every euro! – €180
- Lodging at Hotel alla Posta – €68
Thank you for your interesting and entertaining video report on climbing up to the Grand St Bernard Hospice . Sorry that you have had to miss the walk to St Vincent from Aosta hope you will both feel fitter as soon as possible and feel able to continue and do not have to miss any other stages of the VF on your walk to Rome.
We’re on holiday walking the Via Francigena. Fortunately it’s up to each person how much they walk. We’re just thankful to do what we can and are enjoying every moment!
I love that you are including accomodation details.
Thankyou
I’m glad it’s useful! Thanks!