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The pictures are beautiful, but what about the logistics? Ideally, day stages with lodging and/or public transport at the ends, such as German trails often have. Wild camping is not allowed in France, so a mere gpx trail through the middle of nowhere isn't that useful all by itself.

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Bivouac is allowed. So as long as you don't make fire and are up and packed before 9, you're good.

There's an article about it on the website: https://en.hexatrek.com/hiking-trail/bivouac-rules-in-france

Wow even the rules for bivouac seem bizarre and arbitrary. Only one night in the same place allowed... what if you set out to climb some peaks in the Alps and need to wait a few days for the right weather window, do you have to move your tent every day (and tear it down after sunrise)? Very odd and arbitrary. It almost seems like it would incentivize dangerous fast and loose/sloppy outdoor behavior.

For comparison in the US dispersed camping usually just has very general rules like can't stay in an area more than 30-60 days, have to leave no trace, respect fire bans, and deal with other local restrictions like on hunting, foraging, fire wood collecting, etc.

France has about four times the population density of the US, so it's somewhat easier to step on each other's toes. The idea behind the rules is simple: pick a spot where you don't bother anyone (including protected wildlife) and set up a tarp, not a camp. The latter is somewhat indirectly enforced by forcing you to move

> For comparison in the US dispersed camping

Good luck with dispersed camping in the US east of the Mississippi (or for that matter, in Texas). It is totally reliant on federal public land, which essentially exists only in the western states. Out east [0], or in Texas, you will find yourself in a situation much more similar to the one in France (or England, or Germany, or ...)

[0] and effectively, the east/west boundary is not even the Mississippi, but something like the 101st meridian. Dispersed camping in eastern Kansas is next-to-impossible.

And in Texas don't be surprised to be woken up looking at the muzzle of the rifle of whoever decided they own that patch.

I'm in the PNW and national forests with dispersed camping are everywhere. It's glorious, I can drop everything and disappear into the woods and mountains at any moment.

Mark Twain National Forest is in Missouri and allows dispersed camping.

I tried not to say "impossible". Yes, there are some small bits of national forest in the east (I've stayed in some recently in VA, for example), but they tend to be small and very much the exception.

>It is totally reliant on federal public land, which essentially exists only in the western states.

You do have federal and state lands in the eastern US but, of course, nothing like the vast tracts out west. In any case, with the notable exception of the Appalachian Trail, there are fewer options for long-distance backpacking in the east though there are some hut systems and, subject to various rules, you can find places to camp in national forests in particular.

State land regulations tend to differ from the federal ones. They even vary forest-to-forest. I know that some state forests in PA allow dispersed camping, some do not. Makes it all very confusing.

Directly east of the Mississippi is the Shawnee National Forest in Southern Illinois (https://www.fs.usda.gov/shawnee) with 289,000 acres with both primitive (free but 14 days max per camp spot) and dispersed camping allowed.

I grew up in the area and camped many times with friends in high school and college by just walking a few miles down a trail and then moving off the trail a bit. I believe back then the primitive camping limit was 90 days per spot. The Rainbow People used to push that to the max when they moved through the area.

I live in New England now and other than some remote state parks here in Massachusetts there isn't any primitive camping so you are right about far east of the Mississippi.

For others who didn’t know bivouac is camping without any sort of tent or shelter. In terms of doing a long hike this seems completely unrealistic because you can’t rule out bad weather.

> For others who didn’t know bivouac is camping without any sort of tent or shelter.

Well that's not correct as far as the subject of the article goes. In France at least the term also covers camping in an light tent.

Thanks for clarifying, that is not what the definitions I found via Google said

I can confirm that Google is wrong in this case. Sleeping outside without a tent is generally referred to as “dormir à la belle étoile”, but it is not necessarily implied in “bivouac”.

From my experience (which varies, the rules are local and not nation-wide laws) the difference is whether you can stand in your tent or not. I have seen whether you can carry your tent with your backpack used as a criterion as well.

This might sound like a daft question but is a bivi bag allowed?

If (as the name would imply) it is then it’s not so bad.

Lots of long distance cyclists use this approach in areas where camping is not strictly allowed.

Personally I prefer a lightweight tent but hve thought about getting a supplementary bivibag for stealth.

Either way this route looks magic.

EDIT: having read the page on the site “bivouacking” looks pretty permissive. Since all the pictures show small tents that all looks vey sensible and better that we have in England and Wales (Scotland is very permissive too).

If it rains, I think there's 0 chance that anyone would blink if you put up a tarp for additional shelter.

You're also more likely than not a stone's throw from a cheap municipal campsite that at least has a restaurant attached to it with a Michelin Star. This is France, after all!

There are only 632 Michelin starred restaurants in France, and it is only the 6th most-dense country for such establishments. So no, probably not a stones throw away. Still, probably a great boulangerie to make up for it.

Apparently, Japan is where you want to be if you want to have the lowest average distance to a Michelin restaurant [0]

[0] https://www.chefspencil.com/density-of-michelin-starred-rest...

There's nothing that makes a joke funnier than someone who explains why that joke is statistically unsound.

At your service, with delight!

The actual funny part of it is that campsites in France are actually starred just like Michelin restaurants on their maps (and on their signs - France of course loves to over-sign everything). A 3 star municipal campsite could be 40 Euros for the night!

One of the reasons I spent so many nights in apple orchards.

There you go. That's why if I choose to go on a long distance hike it will be in the US rather than France.

Here's one 6km away from camping

https://goo.gl/maps/muFXPTy9okhex6U48

Here's one 3km away,

https://goo.gl/maps/Qe3QHtKzo6BQ9Hiz9

< 3km,

https://goo.gl/maps/QRob7cDWYZ2ufuQi6

2.3km

https://goo.gl/maps/3kotrgfmjUT4kERbA

I'm sure we can find one closer, but <10km seems to be not out of the ordinary.

France is 643,801km^2 (that number may include some departments not physically part of "Metropolitan France"). If they were uniformly distributed, 632 restaurants would be 1 per 1018km^2. A land area of 1018km^2 is actually a box about 32km per side, and so on average, a restaurant and a campground would be about 16km apart.

So ... you're not far off.

IFFFFF the restaurants were evenly distributed. They almost certainly are not.

I would think municipal (the kind you find in a town) campsites - the kind you find in a town would be closer to a Michelin starred-restaurant - also usually in a town, then on average when just looking at total area.

Anyways, it's fun to look up things on the Internet I guess, but maybe go and camp in France, and go have some dinner out every once in a while - a little meatspace joie de vivre certainly won't hurt. Usually.

Do they have a Michelin star system for campsites in France as well? With rankings for grass softness and lavatory fragrance?

It's mostly to give you an idea on amenities. Like a 1 star campsite will have Turkish toilets and showers; three stars you'll find swimming pools and mini golf courses. Prices for the night usually correlate with stars in an upward trajectory.

No, you can use a tent, as long as you don't stay more than one night.

This is not really correct -- it is not true, for example, in many of the national parks in which people typically hike.

Not allowed, but certainly tolerated. I camped in many an apple tree nursery for months in France, with only a few drunken teens joining me. The gypsy camps were also very accommodating. You could find safe enough places in the middle of Paris to set up a tent.

> Wild camping is not allowed in France

That is not true. It is disallowed in some cases (though these cases involve things like close to listed buildings, which can be quite difficult to know without some research). The country is also covered with camping sites, and refuges in the mountains.

> Wild camping is not allowed in France

Maybe they drastically increased monitoring but my memories of my teenage years are that you could do whatever you wanted, and that was in relatively urbanised areas... so wild camping in the middle of nowhere? No-one will even know.

That's great but we can predict that more attention, more foot traffic and more people will bring the need for more rules around this.

In my experience the French are very tolerant provided you are not making a nuisance of yourself.

There's an app for this trail with more information. But I would have expected some info about lodging on the site, just to set expectations, do people walk with tents, or doable without?

I did a part of it last year. You need to walk with your tent, you won't reach a lodging site every night. I think the longest stretch without civilization (no village/town to buy food etc) is 5 days. So you also need to manage. your food and water supply.

The app is very helpful for that as it gives you water, food and lodging information on the trail related to your current position (so for instance you can see that in 10km there is a river/water fountain/grocery store etc.)

5 days without a resupply is not bad at all. What about camping? Someone here said you are not allowed to pitch your tent on the trail. That would make the whole thing expensive and a logistical nightmare.

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