The approach through Toulouse involves a longer train journey, and is made both by a night and a day train, as in the case of Bordeaux, and from the same station as I have said above. You can lunch on the day train, but you cannot dine upon it. Sleeping at Toulouse, one goes on next day by a morning train, starting a little after nine, and going through Tarbes, will get to Lourdes at about half-past one, or to Bagnères-de-Bigorre a few minutes earlier. Similarly, starting from Toulouse by the same morning train, one can get to Bagnères-de-Luchon just after noon, or to St. Girons at a little before one. It will be seen that these arrivals towards the centre of the chain are much at the same time as by the western approaches through Bordeaux. One gets in towards the middle of the third day in either case.
Moreover, going through Toulouse resembles the journey through Bordeaux; if one undertakes to travel by night, one saves time in much the same manner, save that the night train is earlier. One must leave Paris about half-past eight in the evening, reach Toulouse at much the same hour the next morning, and one will find oneself at the foot of the Pyrenees about mid-day of the day after leaving London, changing at Toulouse for the morning train to Lourdes, Bagnères-de-Bigorre, Luchon, St. Girons or Foix, respectively. There is, however, an exception to this apparently general rule that the shortest journey to the Pyrenees, even if one travels by night, must take well over the twenty-four hours.
As to the approach from Perpignan, this is useful for that little corner of the range which overlooks the Roussillon which is less than one-tenth of the total length. Only one important height is to be found here, the Canigou. The railway journey is very long. If one goes by day, it is imperative that one should break it somewhere. It would be more accurate to say that one can make it by day only if one breaks it somewhere, and if one makes it by night, one must leave Paris in the evening in order to get to Perpignan for lunch, or at half-past eight to get in at two. It is no way to approach the Pyrenees, unless one happens to be taking a journey down France for other purposes which will lead him towards the districts of Narbonne and Perpignan. It must be noted that since the war there is an excellent cross-country train from Bordeaux and Toulouse to Narbonne, where change for Perpignan.
No other approach to the Pyrenees save these by railway from the north will be of use to most travellers from England.
The new, good and fast day train from Toulouse is now at eleven in the morning.
The approaches from the south, in the rare case of a traveller who may take the Pyrenees on the way back from Spain, are all difficult with the exception of the line from Saragossa to Jaca. A main line leads of course from the capital to Saragossa, there one must cross the Ebro to the station upon the northern bank. The train to Jaca goes by Huesca and it takes all day, but it is worth doing in order to get within a day’s walk of the main range.
From every other centre, except from Pamplona, the Pyrenees are hopelessly distant. Seo and the Catalan valleys depend upon Barbastro as does the valley of the Cinca in Aragon, but it is a most tedious journey in stuffy omnibuses followed by an equally tedious day and a half or two days upon a mule before you find yourself in the high Pyrenees. Pamplona is, roughly speaking, one day’s walk from the heart of the mountains, and no other town, excepting Jaca, upon the railway on the Spanish side is worth considering as a rail-head.
It should be noted that there is during the summer months a motor car service between Pamplona and Jaca, which goes along the valley of the Aragon and covers the distance in the better part of a day.