It's a Biduze vein. It crosses Oztibarre and Amikuze, bringing wealth in many cases and rarely, as in early July last year, destruction, devotion and sadness. All the streams were out of the habit. How many houses and how many bridges had brought the yellowing wave of wild water, rounded off for just an hour? The old people themselves said that they had never seen anything like that. That is why, most of the time, Biduze goes in front, dressed in dignity and peace.

The many roads of the slopes of Biduzen are scrambled. They were crushed by Romans, soldiers of the armies of Navarre and Beilaris of Santiago de Compostela. In the Gibraltar area over Donapaleu, the main trails that arrive from Puy in Velay, Tours and Arlest cross over to Ibañe.

Today they are marked with Santiago’s clam seal: between March and October, thousands of people pass through the airy stretch of trails from Arankue to Larzabal. The river and the roads have as guards Izura and Arroze. In Arroz is the impressive chapel without a roof that has been renovating for a long time.

Life in the villages has gone to Donapaleu

Donapaleu is the lung of the growing area of Biduz. Abanzu counts 2,000 inhabitants in the city's coat of arms with Navarre chains that threaten the heart of the emerald. The public services of the region, the schools and the ikastola, the gas stations, the supermarkets are already concentrated, after the people have disappeared during these three decades.

When the workplace was sawn, in the supplement of the newspaper La Palabra del Norte, Nuevo, we read the story of Larzabal's post lady. A history that has been repeated many times in rural areas. The dream cities of those who work in Aizuste, Unaso, Garruze or Behaskane, Donapaleu or Baiona have been developed: new houses have been built, checking the very nature and dreams of remoteness of the city.

That distant time of the barges

Between Donaixti and Gixune there are strong villages such as Donaixti, Jduo, Larribarre, Burgue, Akamarre, Bidaxune and Gixune.

Biduze can be packed from the mouth of Samatz to Akarpa. In the Middle Ages, Baiona was one of the ports of the kings of Navarre and the goods descended in the barges of Akamar, at the Port Biduze pier, which can still be admired on the riverbank: The salt of Salies preserved in the communal forests of Amikuze the basses of seeds, sheep and cattle meats, corn and bread grains, groomers, fabrics, tiles produced in the caserades and the red briks.

The barges returned loaded with black bell pepper, coffee, chocolate, leaving the results of world trade in the ports of Guixune, Bidaxune and Akamar. From here, the riches were transferred to the most hunched valleys, either at the expense of the living, or by the cart pulled by the oxen.

The old fasting, now coexist

The river was a convenient instrument that facilitated a prudent economy. Also the benefactor. As we continue through Biduze we realize that there are many mills. Each people could have more than one to grind all kinds of grains: the maize and bread cited above, the back, the rye or the barley.

A multitude of pilgrims have become a residence, although the only ones have retained their old function, as a place of visit when the day of Eihe is celebrated. The gigantic mill of the late Gabriel of Ilhar will soon be hidden by branches of bush, herbs, nettle and tree bran. The platform that cut the river is still, in one moment or another, broken by a galerna. The abandoned circular mills are based on the pastures of the vegetable garden exhibitors, far from their basic function.

The large valley of Biduze was erected as a laboratory of new agriculture under the direction of the Christian-Democratic developer Jean Errecart, Mayor of Orgrip, outside the Second World War. The nearest peasants of Amikuze were married, and in the first wagons of the city their many children were founded. The number of marriages abandoned when walking through the campas of Labetze or Zohazti, being in Gabadi, raises questions for the walker.

Rural exodus

The first experiments of Green Europe were carried out on the hillside of Biduze, land reorganisations, lake drilling, the creation of the Lur Berri cooperative and agricultural licing, random pools and the construction of a curative clinic in Donapaleu. The rural exodus collapsed and the canton of Donapaleu became a workplace for many.

Cattle, sheep, horses are rented in grasslands and green grasslands. As you approach any farmhouse, you hear carraspeos and ducks, especially between Donapaleu and Gixune. Here's the famous liver that's served on year-end banquets. Horticulture is complemented by livestock farming. In recent decades, organic cultivation has also expanded its scope in the Biduze Valley.

At the same time, structures have also been put in place to welcome the walkers and walkers. In general, people on the Biduze shore are striving to find life-saving chinarrillas, who come together every Friday in the covered market of Donapaleu to exchange the news of Oztibarre and Amikuze, not only.

The thread of peoples with identity

Donaixti, Bunuze, Arroze, Izura, Jduo, Larribarre-Sorhapürü, Uharte Amikuze, Behaskane, Donapaleu, Aizuste, Gamue-Zohazti, José, Gabadi, Labetze, Ilharre, Burgue - Erreaxi, Samamixatu If at first the river is firm and straight, when it is about to be thrown to Aturri it is chased, like winding, with curves, because the clay soil is easier to open.

Above the trail, silent and quiet, the stork flows, leaving in the water gigantic meadows, white and abundant fish. One side of the Amikuze forest is found by the river between Erango and Bidaxune: The Apatarenea can be seen at any time a playful walk around the chiripá, taking advantage of the freshness of the braces, the pines, the alisos, the donkeys and the robles.

Multi-lingual corners

The edges of Biduze are linguistically polyphonic. Oztibarre and Amikuzen obviously is the Basque who goes up to the lips, but beyond Bidaxune the Occitan – with the music of the Gascon… – is mixed with the footprints of the Basque. In Akamarre, Gixune or Bardoze there are elderly people who still know Euskera. It was thought that the Basque was going to be lost in Amikuze 30 years ago, but it was the other way around: the speakers have been growing especially thanks to the ikastolas of Donapaleu and Izura and the Manex Erdozaintzi-Etxart schools of Larzabal. In most bilingual schools there are courses of approach to Basque for several hours.

Continuing with the field of culture, we add that in Donapaleu he became accustomed to marrying Mrs. Erdoi in the 16th century Allande Oihenart, the Ibarlese poet Manex Dozaintzi-Etxart spent working days at the residence of the Franciscans and Eñaut Etxamendi together sang the future of the Comarca. Not to mention Antton Luku, also founded in Amikuz.

Shelters from Donaixti, source from Biduze

We ended the journey, in the foothills of the cave in which the Biduze River is persecuted from the womb of the earth. The caves found on the calcium slope of Arbailak are those of Donaixti. The coming and going of the three hours always satisfies the eyes and the desire.

Biduze does not cut the navel with its original magma: it comes from the dark hole, immediately shaping the clear water well and competing for smooth stones. In summer the beds of the river are dry and in winter they overflow and the paths slide through the silt. When we see the shadows and the lights of the trees from the entrance to the cave, we seem to be at the moment of the beginning of the world.

Anything can happen on the Biduze route.

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