3 November 2025 – Bernia Fort

 

 Once a month we like to offer a more challenging walk than our usual 9km valley walk.

They are usually a short version of the many mountain walks we used to do

This is our favourite of those harder walks

Not all of the group wish to do these walks

This time 12 members declined for a variety of reasons

But that still left 21 of us eager to do the walk

It is more than a year since we last did this walk

So most of the group had not done it before

17 wanted to meet in Jalon, and just 4 at Bernia car park

We organised a car share, so there were only four cars in convoy

It is a very narrow, and very winding, road

A lot of people also drive much too fast

The road was also much busier than I remember, particularly coming the opposite way

So we had to take great care on the many blind corners

And more than once break hard to avoid oncoming traffic

But we all managed to arrive safely

The sign post at the car park confirms that it is only 3 km to the fort

But that is very misleading, due to the climb and the poor path

We always used to say that distance means nothing in the mountains

It is all about terrain and ascent

This walk has the most spectacular scenery of all the walks we do

And we had frequent short stops to admire the view and take photographs

I took 80 photos, and was sent 60 more from other members

I weeded them down as much as I could

But am still left with 40, making this the longest blog I have done

There has been extensive work done at the fort since we last visited

This included fencing the whole area

This resulted in a replacing the approach track to the fort

I was surprised to find there are no marking at all

But forewarned we did manage to find the correct track first time

The entrance to the fort is a great improvement

With a magnificent view of the fort and Bernia behind

It was sunny but cloudy, with a cool wind

Great for walking, but not very comfortable sitting

But we soon warmed up on the return journey

We have always visited bar Refugia after the walk

So I was disappointed to find it closed

However there is always bar Claudia in Jalon as a “Plan B”

It was a great walk, much enjoyed by all

Must not wait so long before we do it again

Temperature – 17-21c

Time Taken – 3.5 hours

Distance – 6 km