On the way to a beautiful medieval town

 

DIDIER HEUMANN, ANDREAS PAPASAVVAS

 

We divided the course into several sections to make it easier to see. For each section, the maps show the course, the slopes found on the course, and the state of the roads. The courses were drawn on the “Wikilocs” platform. Today, it is no longer necessary to walk around with detailed maps in your pocket or bag. If you have a mobile phone or tablet, you can easily follow routes live.

For this stage, here is the link:

https://fr.wikiloc.com/itineraires-randonnee/de-schwarzenberg-a-fribourg-cathedrale-par-la-via-jacobi4-32243847

It is obviously not the case for all pilgrims to be comfortable with reading GPS and routes on a laptop, and there are still many places in France without an Internet connection. Therefore, you can find a book on Amazon that deals with this course.

If you only want to consult lodging of the stage, go directly to the bottom of the page.

Today, the route leaves the canton of Bern, which you crossed from side to side for the canton of Fribourg. But these two cantons have had their destiny linked for centuries, since the heroic era and of the Habsburg in Bern and the Zähringen in Fribourg. There are still some hints of it, in a canton that speaks two languages.

We are around the year 1200 and the region is part of Burgundy. So, the legend is created. Fribourg does not yet exist. Only one castle, that of the Dukes of Zähringen, is perched on the hill above the Sarine River. Charcoal workers, loggers and fishermen live in thatched cottages along a brush-covered river. Duke Berthold IV went hunting one day in the nearby forest and was surprised alone in the storm. Dressed in a simple way, without one being able to imagine in him a prince, he was lost alone, separated from his men, in the night under the storm. He spotted a flickering light. He went and knocked on the doorstep and the master of the house, a charcoal burner, offered him room and board. When he woke up, he found that his clothes were covered with soot on one side and floured on the other. Hell! The coalman had found nothing better to compose the stranger’s bed than to arrange two sacks of coal and cover them with a sack of flour. So, he swore to himself that it was necessary to build a city, to give freedoms to the charcoal burners and that the color of the flag would be that of the charcoal burner’s bed, black and white, which is still the flag of the canton today.

In the XIIIth century, the city passed into the hands of the Bernese Habsburg, then at the end of the XVth century under the rule of the Dukes of Savoy. After the battle of Morat, which saw the victory of the confederates and the Bernese over Charles the Bold, Fribourg asked to be admitted to the nascent Swiss confederation. It entered as the first semi-French canton in 1481. Then came the Reformation and its concert of incessant conflicts. The 13 Swiss cantons chose their side. But, in many regions, the cohabitation of the two confessions remained difficult most of the time. So, today you are crossing one of these microcosms between Fribourg Catholicism and Bern Protestantism. And here the situation is further complicated by language. This part of the canton of Fribourg speaks German and goes to mass.

Difficulty of the course: Today’s stage (+337 meters/-505 meters) has very reasonable slope variations. The slopes hardly exceed 10% inclination, except for the climb to the high plateau after passing the Sense River, and especially the flip flop on the Sarine River at often more than 25% slope in the city of Fribourg, in end of stage.

 

Today, the roads are still a little more numerous than the pathways:

• Paved roads: 11.4 km
• Dirt roads: 8.6 km

Sometimes, for reasons of logistics or housing possibilities, these stages mix routes operated on different days, having passed several times on Via Podiensis. From then on, the skies, the rain, or the seasons can vary. But, generally this is not the case, and in fact this does not change the description of the course.

It is very difficult to specify with certainty the incline of the slopes, whatever the system you use.

For “real slopes”, reread the mileage manual on the home page.

 

We have divided the route into several sections, to facilitate visibility. For each section, the maps give the route, the slopes found on the route and the state of Via Jacobi.

Section 1: Between countryside, cliffs and river, from the canton of Bern to the canton of Fribourg.

 

General overview of the difficulties of the route: course without difficulty, except for the descent on the Sense River.

 

In Schwarzenburg, it is not the tracks that are missing on the signposts near the station. But beyond Bodensee you are always walking on Via Jacobi 4.

Via Jacobi therefore leaves the borough near the station.

It starts on Bernstrasse, where beautiful old farms still remain. In Schwarzenburg, there is an astonishing mixture of farmhouses and patrician houses, within the center itself.

Near the Market Square, Via Jacobi leaves the axis. Fribourg is announced at almost 5 hours of walking.

A country road then heads towards Wart at the exit of the borough.

Between meadows and corn, the small paved road arrives at Wart. There is indeed a gradual change in the landscape. From here, corn, almost absent from the track in German-speaking Switzerland, becomes more and more visible.

Wart is a small hamlet with a vocation above all agricultural.

Here, it is very nice to remind the pilgrim that he is walking on the Camino de Santiago and that 1,700 kilometers separate him from Santiago.

Beyond the village, the road then descends in the direction of Torhalten.

It oscillates on a slope in the countryside.

The countryside is bucolic at will, with its farms scattered in the meadows.

Further down, Via Jacobi finds a pathway that descends into a valley in the undergrowth.

The valley is very steep with many streams of water flowing.

A pathway paved with stones, very steep and often slippery, descends under the steep cliffs of marl covered with moss in the basin of the Sense River.

A wide dirt road then heads through the hardwoods towards the river bed. The Sense River is not a very big river, but it is wild and there are plenty of stones.

Sometimes in clearings, often in undergrowth, the dirt road flattens along the river. Here it is a landscape similar to that previously found near the Schwarzwasser River. The river carved like a wild canyon in the marl cliffs. At the end of the dirt road, the pathway comes near a wooden bridge.

The route joins the cantonal road and crosses the Sense River on an old wooden bridge, the Sodachbrücke, a bridge built towards the end of the XIXth century, now pedestrianized, a new bridge crossing the river next door.

Here you leave the canton of Bern for the Germanic part of the canton of Fribourg.

Beyond the bridge, a small pathway runs along the Sodbach stream.

Then the pathway leaves the stream and slopes up towards the cantonal road. Just below a café restaurant is available.

After crossing the road, a pathway rises steeply in the undergrowth. There are many stones on the way. It is always hardwoods that are encountered, those of the Swiss forests where beeches abound, with few maples, ashes or oaks. Chestnut is rare in Switzerland.

It crosses the undergrowth to arrive in a clearing.

Higher up, the slope then softens on a dirt road that climbs towards Heitenried, sometimes running through meadows or undergrowth.

On the way a beautiful oratory stands at the edge of the way. The canton of Fribourg is a very Catholic canton.

Section 2: In the Fribourg countryside.

 

General overview of the difficulties of the route: course without any difficulty.

 

The pathway then gradually approaches Heitenreid before reaching the road at the entrance to the village.

The road then crosses the relatively recent part of the village.

Shortly after, Via Jacobi leaves running under the village.

The crosses reappear. Fribourg is a Catholic canton, which is not the case for a large part of German-speaking Switzerland, which is mostly Protestant.

Quickly, a grassy pathway looms in the countryside, along the hedges. Shortly after, it crosses the small stream of Lettiswilbach and heads towards a small undergrowth where hardwoods and spruces mingle.

Here, the slope is gentle on a stony pathway. At the exit of the undergrowth, Via Jacobi reaches Winterlingen hamlet and its few houses.

The pathway then undulates gently in the meadows, along small groves or isolated trees, especially spruces and large oaks.

It soon arrives on the heights of Niedermonten. Here, peasant life is omnipresent, with large meadows and black and white cows scattered everywhere you look. You like it or you don’t like it, it depends. But the pilgrims, for the most part, taste with delight the pleasures of the real countryside.

You see immediately when you arrive in the canton of Fribourg that the farms are often less opulent (but not all!) than in the canton of Bern and that the manure is often in front of the door of the domain.

A grassy pathway gently slopes down through the grass to find the tar. It joins the cantonal road in Niedermonten and its gigantic farms.

Far be it from us to devalue the canton of Fribourg, but we will say that there is perhaps a little less money than in the canton of Bern. Here a beautiful wooden cross marks the crossroads, and to make us lie an extraordinary old farm stands here, as you hardly meet any more.

Near another large and magnificent farm, Via Jacobi leaves the national road for a smaller road.

Section3 : Along the Taverna brook.

 

General overview of the difficulties of the route: course without any difficulty.

 

The small road heads into the countryside towards Sankt Antoni.

It crosses the village with its two churches, one Catholic, the other Protestant. The canton of Fribourg was for a long time attached to the Protestant canton of Bern.

The road crosses from one church to another a village with relatively modern buildings. But some retain a marked and remarkable ancestral character.

What more can we say about this little marvel that today serves as a guest house?

Via Jacobi leaves the village near the Catholic church.

At the exit of the village, a wide gravel road then descends to the bottom of a dale to reach the village of Weissenbach. Along the way, languid Simmental cows watch the pilgrim pass.

The road descends in the undergrowth on a very steep slope along the cliff. But the descent is not long to Weissenbach.

Here, Via Jacobi finds the tar again when it crosses the small stream of Wyssebach.

Shortly after, the small flattens along the stream until you find the cantonal road that descends from Sankt Antoni, whose Catholic church can be seen on the hill.

AAfter a short passage in the grass, Via Jacobi joins the cantonal road. Here, you are less than two hours walk to Fribourg.

Further afield, a pathway flattens to some isolated houses on the other side of the road.

This is also where the Wyssenbach, a very thin stream, arrives.

Not much thicker is the Taverna, a brook that you will follow for a good two kilometers, on a strip of land lost in the grass.

Along the way, a modest oratory is dedicated to Mary.

Nothing happens here except the melancholy that can arise from putting one step in front of the other when considering the grass of the meadows or the bushes of the stream.

At the end of the pathway, Via Jacobi crosses the Taverna brook again and joins the cantonal road which goes towards Tafers.

Section 4: Beautiful chapels before the return to the countryside.

 

General overview of the difficulties of the route: course without any difficulty.

 

Section 5: On the way to the beautiful city of Fribourg.

 

General overview of the difficulties of the route: steeply sloping route in the Old Town of Fribourg.

 

Feel free to add comments. This is often how you move up the Google hierarchy, and how more pilgrims will have access to the site.

 

Next stage: Stage 14: From Fribourg to Visit of Old Town Fribourg

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