direction Rocquigny whose art deco bell tower marks the passage in Picardy
In the footsteps of Father Sigéric who reached Rome on foot in 990, our group of walkers is today in the south of the department of Pas-de-Calais between Beaulencourt and Rocquigny. Vibe
Fourth day of hiking on the Via Francigena. The valleys, the seaside with its cliffs and its unobstructed view of the waves, the forests are no longer there. Make way for the fields, the plateaus, on between the vast wheat fields. You could imagine yourself in Beauce or Brie with a few steeples for unique reliefs.
Lots of heat, little shade. The Via Francigena connects England (where a Canterbury priest, Sigéric, who was ordained bishop, decided to go get his insignia on foot) to Rome.
We are then in 990 and the route passes through Hauts-de-France (Pas-de-Calais, a sector of the Somme and Aisne). For this summer series, we spent five days and as many stages on the Pas-de-Calais route.
Our 4th stage rests Beaulencourt in Rocquigny, in the very south of Pas-de-Calais, on the border with the Somme. Jeannine, one of our traveling companions for the day, has just returned from her pilgrimage still amazed and “troubled”.
Jeannine returns from her pilgrimage amazed and troubled.
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©France Televisions
The course of the day is also a land of memory. British military cemetery at Riencourt-les-Bapaume; German cemetery in Villers-au-Flos. Didier Morel, from the association Compostelle, Francigena Arras, explains that there are places that you can only discover by walking. And that we “take the time to discover”. It is, moreover, according to him, a “characteristic of the pilgrim”.
And it’s the exit from the Pas-de-Calais department symbolized by the 1920s art-deco church in Rocquigny! Exceptional bell tower, church restored in 2013… To discover!
Beyond is the Somme, Picardy, then Reims, Switzerland and Italy. In total, more than 2,200 kilometers in the footsteps of Father Sigéric.