Camino del Norte
23.9 km, 255 m up and 175 m down, through 3 places, 1 of which has somewhere to sleep. Where you stop is up to you.
Every place on the path in order, with the distance from Deba. Most are too small to sleep in — a fountain, a chapel, a bar that may or may not be open — but they are what the day is actually made of.
The camino and the GR-121 alternate route meet in Deba near the ermita. The camino crosses the river along a footbridge near the train station and on the opposite bank turns right. A short distance later it crosses the road and just beyond that it turns left, going upwards once again along a combination of well marked roads and paths.Keep to the marked camino at this point, ignoring all other trails until you reach the Galbario Ermita.
Wave goodbye to the sea. It will be exactly 80km before it returns into view in Bilbao. Between here and there are several mountainous stretches.
The camino joins the road when it reaches the ermita, and follows it to the small village of Ibiri Auzoa.
Just beyond the Albergue and bar turn left at the fork to follow a trail instead of the road. You will rejoin the asphalt road shortly before Olatz.
Follow the road past the bar and small park, and when it forks keep to your right uphill on the narrower option. From here to Markina the camino twists and turns quite a bit. It is countryside walking all the way to Markina, where a steep descent brings you into the city from the north.
The distance from Olatz to Markina is without services of any kind. Be sure to re-fill your water here.
The marked camino passes the church and convent and turns right at the first street past them. Follow the road across a small river and turn left at the first road, keeping close to the nearby building to follow a park trail as is wiggles its way along the river. The camino will take you back over the river (though it is covered so you might not notice) and then under the BI-633. It follows along a smaller river past an industrial park and into Iruzubieta.
Distances are the sum of the town-to-town measurements in my data, not a straight line on a map. Climb and descent come from the altitude of each place listed above, so they under-read where the path goes over a hill between two of them.
Esta entidad ha sido beneficiaria de una ayuda del Programa de incentivos a la movilidad eficiente y sostenible (MOVES III), gestionado por la Xunta de Galicia a través del Instituto Enerxético de Galicia (INEGA) en el marco del Real Decreto 266/2021, y cofinanciada por la Unión Europea — NextGenerationEU, dentro del Plan de Recuperación, Transformación y Resiliencia.