The bordermarker-guide of Michel Molia

At the age of 73 in 2013, Michel Molia – a retired dermatologist from Bayonne – started with his own quest for the bordermarkers of the Pyrenées including starting his own website. And recently the Pyrénées Magazine published a nice article about him: I met him several times with as a peak experience our trip to […]

Breaking news: bordermarkers 408 III and IV found by Xabi Molia

Today I was proud – together with Jan-Willem Doomen – to be witness of the discovery of these lost intermediate markers. Michel Molia has been intrigued by the fate of these missing markers (see this page) and visited this remote mountain slope many times. Four intermediate markers were placed in 1969 after a shift of […]

The 408-submarkers: Michel Molia’s quest

In the last weeks Michel Molia (from http://michelmolia.pagesperso-orange.fr/) has done a lot to find the missing submarkers 408III and IV. Without result but by doing so he could eliminate possible locations and narrowing down the terrain for future searches. The submarkers 408-I to IV were placed in the 1960-ies in a change of the borderline to […]

The Bidaubus-dispute : an update

What is the Bidaubus-dispute? We are talking about the esfr-borderline between bm407 and 409, not far from Bagnères-de-Luchon. The dispute has been described in full detail on earlier webpages and blogposts. A starting point could be this post from 2018 and this video: The different views on the borderline between bm407 and 409 : a […]

Jean Marc did them all (and very fast)

Jean Marc Dumont was a new and promising star in our field and now he has already reached his zenith: on 4 september he did his very last bordermarker: bm602 (with a kayak). And he did them all astonishingly fast: in 3 years! I already introduced Jean Marc (aka Marko) in the previous post and […]

Bordermarker-bashing in the Basque Country: 3 new cases

The esfr-bordermarkers in the Basque country are not safe. Recently the markers 76 and 100 have disappeared and no. 101 has been broken off: For Basque nationalists, the esfr-border should be non-existent, cutting in half a region that should be an independent whole. There is an iconic picture of the ‘execution’ of bm098 in which […]

Champagne at the border: Corinne’s final bordermarker

Saturday 11 September 2021: a very special day for Corinne Gourgeonnet. After 6 years, she completed her quest to find and photograph each and every bordermarker along the French-Spanish border. The last one to do was well chosen: bm311 at Col de Sobe. A touristic train brought her to Lac d’Artouste which left 2 hours […]

Gorospil: the Bermuda-triangle of the esfr-border

Michel Molia (website) reported to me on July 9th that bm076 in the Basque country has disappeared: Not an easy act of vandalism because bm078 was a massive pillar: Bordermarkers do disappear or are destroyed on some occasions but in the case of bm076 (and bm076), this is not the first time. At least 5 or […]

Alain Gillodes: all bordermarkers done

Alain Gillodes reported to me that on June 19th, 2021, he visited his very last esfr-bordermarker. It is perhaps the most iconic one: no. 602 in the Cova Forada, a cave at the Mediterranean coast, accessible only by boat or swimming. It was a birthday present of his two sons who hired a boat to […]

Carlos & Conchita: halfway on their quest

This cheerful couple from Barcelona started in 2016 with searching and photographing esfr-bordermarkers. This is their website. First, they covered the eastern Pyrenees, east of Andorra. Then they made a crucial decision: let’s try to do all 602 esfr-bordermarkers. They worried a bit about their age (they look 55 but are actually a tiny bit […]