"We're Not Judging You"

When someone says that, it means they are judging you. I met a very nice couple. Tom is Canadian and Orsy is Romanian/Hungarian (I.e. a Gypsy. Thats how she introduced herself).  The first day I met them I confessed to not being able to tolerate the "20 to a room" barrack style aubergues. They assured me they weren't judging me for that. Later in the day I saw them in town. They were shocked that I was wearing jeans and a cashmere sweater. I explained that the comfort was worth it because I wore the jeans every night and the sweater weighs nothing. They also assured me they weren't judging me on that, either.

There's only one guidebook that everyone (including me) seems to use. The author is not fond of today's stage from Guernica to Bilbao. At 35km its the second longest of the 32 stages and the combined vertical climb (850 meters) makes it the second or third hilliest. The book specifically warns about the second half.  A nine mile straight flat stretch followed by a 400 meter climb, then descent into Bilbao.

I think most of us stopped for lunch in the same village at the halfway point, but arrived at different times. I felt fine afterward so I put some music on and set off. As I reached the edge of the village I looked up at a blue bus marked Bilbao and made eye contact with Orsy, who was sitting by the window in the front row. She quickly looked away - like I was judging her or something!

Of course I'd never do that but I will say that they missed something great. The climb into the hills above Bilbao was nasty but freaking hills ALWAYS deliver the view. Not only that but the descent into the city was even nicer than the entrance to San Sebastian. There were three parts of the descent. The first was a lightly used road from a big park with lots of picnic tables and great views. Next was a series of pedestrian bridges and nice switchbacks that passed some beautiful restaurants (the picture of the city, which if you look closely shows the Guggenheim Museum next to a bridge was taken from the terrace of one of those restaurants) and the last third of the way down was a long, long staircase alongside a midevil cobblestone street (that's the other picture) that ended in an old plaza full of cafés and packed with people. 

Tom and Orsy weren't the only ones who took the bus. A couple of km outside the lunch village I saw three extremely nice German people I'd met earlier who were waiting at a bus stop. I'll try not to tell any of them what they missed out on because rubbing it in is almost as bad as judging.

Guernica

I'm not sure whether I'm most interested in this town because I'm a New Yorker, Jill lives in Spain or just history in general.

I saw the Picasso painting at MoMA on a class trip in high school and remember what a big deal it was when they finally returned it to Spain. I saw it again at the Prado's annex across from Retiro Park sometime in mid eighties and then again once it moved to the Reina Sofia. So I've been stalking it for years.

Right after it was painted, Guernica was important because of how it informed the world of how nasty the Spanish civil war, Franco and the axis powers were. It became even more so as a symbol of how new technology was being weaponized against innocent civilians; warning of a genie that couldn't be re-bottled.

Gernika is a nice, working class town in a valley. Not a whole lot of old buildings here, for obvious reasons.

Chula!

Most places I stay at in Spain ask to see my passport. The woman who did so today was funny. She didnt speak a word of English so I thought it was weird when she opened my passport and said "Connecticut". 

There is a Jai Alai cesta hanging on the wall so I pieced together pretty much every Spanish word I know to ask her where I could buy and authentic "pelota" (jai alai ball). 

Since this town (Markina - Exemein) is the epicenter of the Jai Alai world I mentioned that I watched a lot of it when I was a teenager. The two and two came together and I realized why she seemed interested that I'm from Connecticut. Her brother used to play at all of the CT frontons!  I asked if she'd ever heard of Aromayo and she said "the brothers?"  Made my friggin day!  For those of you who aren't Lyle, Dave, Bob or Frank, the highest profile players back in the day were Aromayo 1 and Aromayo 2.

Anyway, she claims that there are plenty of places to buy pelotas in the town I'll end up in tomorrow. I was already pretty excited about tomorrow's destination seeing as its named after a famous Picasso painting. Kidding of course, but I think the idea of walking into a town like Guernica will be a thought provoking experience.

This was just the fourth day on the Norte but so far it has been better than I'd even hoped it would be. It's extremely strenuous compared to any other four day stretch I've done but the combination of mountains and seascapes is outrageously beautiful.

There are lots more people on it then Montpellier to Pau. I even feel like my old unsociable self again, avoiding people!

Rainy Day. Now In Zarautz

I just wish I could have found an excuse to spend another day in San Sebastian. There is so much energy there and for the one night I was there the food exceeded my expectations. I ended up sitting down for pinxtos (basque tapas) and the food was out of this world. The highlight was a little filet mignon (solomio) for €5.

I'm embarrassed to have to say this but I'll go back to San Sebastian before Toulouse!  I'll be done with this camino in about four weeks. Who wants to join me in San Seb for a.couple of days?!

Utterly Spectacular

I knew at dinner last night that shifting north was the right decision. I wandered around Irun and stopped at a bar or two and at 8:30 found a friendly looking restaurant so I stopped in. I was the first guest but it was full within a half hour. As if the staff wasn't nice enough, the family sitting next to me (couple with three kids between 12 & 20) were above and beyond welcoming and even tried to pick up my dinner tab!

I found the camino with no problem. It's weird that on three of the five routes I've been on, the first day has the reputation for being the hardest. but let me tell you:  It was goose bump spectacular. The first hour out of Irun was a big climb and the view of the city was incredible.

Days like today make me glad that I don't bother researching the day ahead because the surprise of what came next made it all the better. Four hours or so into the day I came across a really dramatic looking cove. I was several hundred feet up but could see and hear some lively bars down by the water.  I was certain that the trail went all the way around the back of the cove and was confused when the yellow arrows pointed down a long, steep set of stairs. They went between houses and through people's yards all the way down to the water. The yellow arrows pointed down a ramp to a floating dock. Sure enough, for 70 cents a small ferry boat pulled up and hauled a bunch of us to the other side of the cove. Once I got in to San Sebastian I looked it up and the town on the cove is called Pasaia and has a very colorful history.

On the far side of the cove an even longer and steeper set of stairs went up and the trail ran along the north side of the hill with beautiful views of the Bay of Biscay.

Finally the trail led down to San Sebastian. No drab suburbs or outskirts - right from the scenic trail into the heart of the scenic city.

A lot of people consider San Sebastian to be the culinary capital of the western world. I'm going to do some research and find some good eats. 

Pulled the Rip Cord!

I'm headed to Irun to start the Camino del Norte and have seen more backpacks in the last two hours then in the previous four weeks.

The Pau train station is at the bottom of a cliff from the rest of the city. There's a "funicular" that shuttles up and down from the train station to town, but it's closed for maintenence until the 27th. I resisted the temptation to wait for it to reopen and walked around to the bottom of the cliff. There were backpacks galore.
I'm sure most of them were headed to St. Jean Pied de Port.

I'm in Dax waiting for a connecting train to Irun. I got a haircut in Dax a couple of years ago!

Giving Myself A Pep Talk

11:00AM - I still don't know what to do.  I'm most tempted to continue with my latest plan which is to keep going to Puente la Reina, walking back to Pamplona & taking a train to Iruna or San Sebastian.  It feels like that will take forever though.

4:30PM - Still pondering.  If I do the above It'll take me ten more days to get to Pamplona and by then I dk if I'll have the will to start a whole new camino in Irun.  I'll be more likely to continue on the traditional route, which I've already done.  I really don't want to spend another day thinking about it in Pau.

5:00PM - I flip-flop on this every 10 minutes.  The case against continuing this route includes the fact that the rest of it is more very long days (30km +) with few bail-out options.

5:45PM - If I walk to Oloron St. Marie tomorrow, it will be my last chance to get a train to Irun until I get to Pamplona.  The route from Irun is compelling because of the scenery (all along the coast), food, and the fact that it would be all new.  On the other hand, I'd be missing out on crossing the Pyrenees.  I just checked the weather for the Somport Pass.  100% chance of rain on Sunday & Monday.  Hmm.

When in France ...

I feel like I'm on strike. I had a comical performance trying to move forward today. The plan was to make it to the outskirts of Pau which is only 8km away.

I thought it was supposed to be old and interesting, but didn't find it to be. I was going to start in the municipal place for €10 but I got to the town hall just after it closed for two hours. I walked most of the way to a hotel two km away but it was on a highway between a tractor dealer and gravel yard. It was only 12:30 so I figured I'd cut my losses and found a bus back to Pau.

I'm still undecided about where to go next. I might just stay in Pau one more day to decide. This route is so un-user-friendly.

Pau

Very nice city. But the worst sushi imaginable. They tried to make me dunk it in their special syrupy sweet sauce instead of good old salty soy sauce.

I found a place that served whiskey.  I had three of them in an effort to disinfect my body from that sushi.

It seems that the 2015 French chess championships are being held in Pau starting on the 26th.

I don't know what's with the "Brooklyn" building here in Pau. I think they're trying to be edgy.

Damn. I'm here!

All of a sudden I'm in the thick of the Pyranees -Atlantic region. I feel like I have a lot of options to consider before moving on to Spain.

The traditional route skirts around a city called Pau. I'm only about 15 km from the city now and am leaning toward taking a day or two there to consider my options.

One option that I'm just starting to consider is continuing on this route (soon to be officially the Camino Aragonnes ) to Puente la Reina, but instead of doing the traditional route to Santiago, walk back to Pamplona, take a train to Irun or San Sebastian and walking the northern route. I'd need to make damned sure I'm not the only one on that route though.

Part of me is tempted to cut over to St. Jean Pied de Port and do the Roncesvalles pass through the mountains instead of the Somport pass. Yesterday a guy in Maubourguet said that this route is empty now because the there's still too much snow on Somport. Not sure I buy that but it does make me think I've got some thinking to do in Pau.

Too Pooped To Post

Not for any specific reason. Today wasn't a particularly challenging day at all. Except that I did get lost in the morning and once I got to this town (Maubourguet) I realized that the whole freaking place is closed on Sundays. A pizza place was open so I grabbed one and brought it to my room. Even the manager of the "hotel" I'm at went home at 6PM so I called her and told her I couldn't eat my pizza without wine so she sent her husband back over with a half bottle of red.

I've been watching my over-achieving Mets on "gamecast" for the past couple of hours. They're about to blow a six run lead. But at least I have wifi.

I can tell I'm getting pretty close to the mountains because there are more rivers and streams, and they're flowing more rapidly.

I'm fed up with Google. For too many reasons to go into right now but one example is that the Google blogging app that I use will not allow me to post a short video - taken from my Android (Google) phone. The Mac version of Blogger WILL let me post a video from my laptop but it won't import videos from my phone.

Anyway, first world problems. I have a great audio recording of a frog pond on my phone as well but Google won't let me post it from their own frickin operating system to their own frickin blogging system. Thanks for letting me vent.

Here's a picture of a cow and another one of a very narrow bridge.

People

They were just hiking for the day and standing in the middle of the path as I walked up. I think they noticed that it looked funny when half of them stepped to one side of the path and the other half to the opposite side. We all had a good laugh though.

The Best Place

Cafe - Bar - Hotel - Restaurant Auberge is a humble looking place. It's also the only place to stay in Montesquiou unless you want to stay on a goose farm where they brag about showing you how they make fois gras.  Montesquiou is where I stayed last night, without wifi.

The room was clean, quiet and comfortable. But the food was ridiculously good. It was one of those places that you eat whatever they put in front of you. First a huge pot of pumpkin soup that I had two bowls of. Then a plate of perfectly ripe canteloupe slices, prosciutto style ham, delicious home-made quiche and a green salad with balsamic vinegar & oil. The main course was a pan fried flaky white fish that I think was fluke or flounder, with potatoes sauteed in red wine & oil (I think).  A nice sized pitcher of red wine was already on the table.  Desert was rum raisin ice cream served in a glass coated with Armanac  (I think).  The family that run the place are all super friendly and welcoming. Breakfast the next morning was the usual.  The bill for the whole shabang (room, dinner, breakfast)?  €39.

Headed South

It feels completely different going south.  this Time of year the sun has been behind me and to the left until late afternoon. I felt nice to be walking toward the sun this afternoon.

I'm in serious farm country now. Not really big agro. Mostly smaller farms. I'm not sure what they're growing but will take some pictures tomorrow to see if anyone can identify what it is. It seems like mostly all the same crop. Looks like corn shoots but they're already knee high and it's nowhere near the 4th of July. My early guess is sunflowers.

It's hard to believe any Jing can grow in that kind of "soil".  It must be mostly clay because the clumps are so hard I can barely break them with my walking stick. Walking in farmland like this is kind of a drag because of the clay. It ranges from ankle deep mud that you can barely pull your foot out of, to rock hard tractor tracks they wreak havoc on the ankles. There are like 50 states of clay, none of them good to walk on!

I actually took a decent picture of the  tractor tracks I'm dealing with but where I'm staying has no wifi and barely a cellular data connection.

Tomorrow is a nice 23km jaunt to a town called Marciac. I should have good wifi there.

I'm Still In Auch

No excuses except laziness. Nothing new to report except it's finally supposed to rain for the next couple of days.

There's a Carrefour Express here in Auch so I got some dark chocolate. Six packs of Heineken were on sale for €2.70 but only if you get two of them. I'm sick of that tuna in mayo crap so I didn't restock. Besides when I bought the first batch I also got a pack of plastic forks. Threw half of them away and stuck the rest in a pocket in my pack. Now whenever I stick my hand in that pocket I get a plastic fork tong up the cuticle. A spoon would have worked just as well.

Anyway, off to get some Indian food.

The Name Sets the Tone

Auch. Sounds like ouch.

I couldn't believe the final six km into this town today. Walk along a superhighway going away from town for a km, go under it and back along the other side of the superhighway for a km. Then take a right past a manure processing plant, then through a dump, up past an industrial complex and you think you're home free. But no. Now your back to the same superhighway and the signs point back away from town again. A couple hundred meters later you go back under the highway and up a hill past the "Boeuf du Gers" factory. Ie, a slaughterhouse. I swear it was six km of this when Google maps would have had me here in two.

Don't get me started about how awesome it was walking into Toulouse!

Anyway, I'm staying at the Hotel de France. It's what the Grand Budapest Hotel would be like if it were run by Basil Fawlty.

It wasn't all bad today. I did get lost for an hour though. I need to pay better attention to specific directions.

When I finally got to my room and took off my first boot a bee flew out of it. It was caught between my sock and the tongue of the boot. It didn't really fly out - it was more of a stumble. The little fella  WALKED around the bed toward the window. I opened it for him and off he went.

I had a great meal at a Chinese restaurant down the street but felt bad because I was the only one there. I told the owner (Helen from Hong Kong) that if I were her I'd get outta Auch and head for Toulouse!

Speaking of Toulouse, here's a family of ducks and a turtle in the canal on the way in. 

Do You Have A Dog?

It's 27c here in Gimont.  That's 84f.  I left this morning with just two half liter bottles of water and by the time I reached the village of Monferrand-Saves at around 12:30, they were both empty.  I couldn't find a drinking fountain or store that sold water.  With14km further to walk I was very lucky to stumble upon Francine's second grade class having lunch outside in the playground.

I got the teacher's attention and she was beyond nice about filling my two empty water bottles.  We introduced ourselves and when she went inside, the kids started shouting things at me in practically perfect English.  There were like 12 of them and they were asking "what's your name?", I thought to myself wow what nice friendly kids - and they speak excellent English. I said "Je m'apelle Steve", in practically perfect French.  Next they all seemed to want to know if I had a dog.  I told them "no, avez-VOUS un chien?"

Francine the teacher came back with my water and was so damned charming.  I'm pretty sure that they had English class just before lunch.  Her grin told me that.  I had been going head-to-head with an entire class of seven year olds, dueling in foreign language skills at a second grade level.  I wasn't winning but I wasn't losing either.

I'm mad at myself for not taking their picture but the timing seemed wrong.  As I started walking away Francine said something to them and they all yelled "bon chemin" or "bon voyage" and I yelled back "bon apetit!"

I ran into Dominic and Guido just after meeting the kids - they're the guys from the day I was lost twice going into Castres.  Dominic is the one who speaks English and he told me that they had just been talking about how they'd probably never see me again.  I told him that yesterday I walked around Toulouse for four hours or so and then took the train (I LOVE French trains) to the suburbs and walked another hour or so to L'Isle du Jourdain.  The guidebooks all say to do that.  He scoffed at me for taking a train and I kind of laughed in his face (in a nice friendly way of course) and asked him how he liked walking through the burbs.  It turns out he didn't.  He got a ride in a car from friends to pretty much the same place.

Have I mentioned how much I love Toulouse?  It's nice to be back out of the city and past the suburbs.  Tomorrow I'm headed for a small city called Auch.  The route is supposed to be nice rolling hills and in a day or two the path starts heading south towards the Pyrenees.

I downloaded the first couple of episodes of Veep season three so will watch a little of that before hitting the hay.

Supermax?

I'm staying in the oddest place tonight in L'Isle du Jourdain (I think).  More than once I've said that you can't get a bad meal in France.  I take that back.  Granted I'm esthetically hung over from Toulouse but this place is grim.  I'm not going to disparage it by name because the people are nice enough and they have good wifi but the food probably ranks somewhere between penitentiary and public school.  The proprietor's two year old kid was crawling around on the floor in the dining room crying because he threw his binky under the ice cream cooler.  The waiter came over with a broom and fished it out for him but the family dog grabbed it first & ran away with it.

Rather than dwell on the unpleasant - did I tell you how awesome Toulouse is?  I walked through a lot more of it today and it is definitely the nicest city I've ever seen.  Sorry Pamplona.

Le Trek Tolouse

Get it?  Le Trek Toulouse?

I've got to say, Toulouse is the nicest city I've ever seen. Granted it's only been four hours and the weather is stupendous but this place has got it all.

In addition to spectacular architecture on a gorgeous confluence of rivers and canals, it has a beautiful mix of ethnicities that all just seem to add their own flavor to the city's core Frenchness.

Speaking of the "flavor of Frenchness", there really isn't much, at least as far as food is concerned. Thus I'm writing from my table at Le Majarajah, an Indian pace in the heart of the old part of town. I've been Jonesing for Indian food forever and this place didn't disappoint.  Onion bahjis and medium spicy salmon curry was just the fix I needed.

Tomorrow will be 3 weeks Since I left and it seems like three months.

It's been an interesting trip. Except for the two guys I met while going the wrong way AFTER getting lost, I haven't met a single person unless I was paying them or asking for directions. That hasn't really bothered me much but today I wish you were all here to enjoy Toulouse with me. 

Good Eating!

It's happenned more than once. I'm about to dig in, someone says "good eating!", and wonders if they got it right. I enjoy the proud looks they have when I tell them that in my country we say "bon apetit."

It was another long one today. I ended up staying on the Canal du Midi all day today and it wasn't as horrible as I feared. At least terraIn-wise. Still, by the time I got to where I am now (seems like the Wilton, CT suburb of Toulouse) I was vowing to take a bus, rent a car or hitch a ride on a canal boat into the city.

I know this is my personal hang-up, and it's irrational but I have a weird fury toward serious cyclists.  The pedestrian path along the canal is also an officially designated cycling path.  Don't get me wrong, the families and regular folk that were cycling to get somewhere or for recreation are a pleasure to share the path with. It's the other 80% with their stupid lycra outfits, cycling shoes and serious cycle scowls that make me want to jam my walking stick through their front spokes.

Anyway, if you walk along a canal long enough, you get to see it in action. I passed at least 10 sets of locks today and towards the end I reached one just at the same time as a pleasure boat. It was pretty cool to watch the process. Just the couple on the boat doing the whole process themselves.

More Perfect Union

I hope everybody enjoyed the picture of the horse yesterday. Matt Harvey was pitching at 730 local time and I had to watch the gamecast on my laptop. How bout those Mets!

Last night I stayed at a truck stop about a half km from the path. It was a little grittier than Le Routier in Old Saybrook but it had authentic French trucks parked outside.  The owner is a friendly guy. I'm thinking my French must be getting better because we got into a conversation about whether dark chocolate or "Melissa Water" is better for overcoming fatigue.

Eau de Melisse might be the oldest continuously produced product in the world. The current concoction has been sold since 1611. It's only sold in pharmacies and is 80% alcohol and infused with nine spices and fourteen other plants. The bottles come with dropper tops and you're supposed to saturate a sugar cube with it and pop it in your mouth. Maybe it's a placebo effect but I don't think so. You're only supposed to do it two or three times per day. After getting my first bottle I did five cubes before dinner and didn't sleep well at all.

Anyway, the walking has been kind of dull. Very nice but pretty much more of the same. Today's route was about 30km, the first 20 of which were alone g the Rigole river, which feeds the Canal du Midi. The CdM  indirectly connects the Atlantic to the Mediterranean and was built in the late 1600s (I'm thinking it was the result of Eau de Melisse).  Good canal I guess but a canal is a canal, right?  And so damned flat. I took a "variante" for the last 10km which went over some hills and ended up down at the Canal where I'm staying tonight.

This place is a big win. €47 for a room in a place that reminds me of the Montauk Yacht Club. I'm just finishing dinner now. Had the cassoulet which was a sizzling union of meat and bean! 

Note:  I've been trying to upload this for over an hour from my phone.  I had some good pictures but Android and Google Blogger won't cooperate with each other.  Thank God I brought my laptop.  I/m going to watch some Veep!

Can Confirm. He Only Speaks To Wilbur

It was a one way conversation.

The Flats

Today was only 24 km but the flatness was painful. Things seem very different all of a sudden. I guess I'm headed towards civilization because things are getting more expensive.

Does anyone remember the "Edge" network?  It was before LTE, 4G and 3G and has been obsolete in most places I've been since 2008. For the past 12 days the only data connection available has been Edge. Now I'm back to a 4G signal.

The weather today is perfect. Literally not a cloud in the sky and 21c (72f) so I spent most of the day in shorts and short sleeves.

I bought pretty much all of my walking clothes at a store called REI. Some of it in West Hartford and the rest in NYC. It just occurred to me that REI clothes are like Garanimals. Garanimals were a clothing line where everything always matched, as long as you wore a shirt and pants with the same animal on it. A duck shirt is always color coordinated with duck pants. REI clothes are the same way. It's embarrassing. The problem boils down to a pair of light beige pants that I used to have, but the zipper broke so I had to replace them. Unfortunately my replacement pants are "REI gray".  They're like the master garanimal animal. Like The Dude's rug, these pants tie every piece of clothing I have together. I want the grunge look. I hate to admit this but I'm going to have to splurge on a pair of off-color hiking pants.

This is the topographic chart of the route and as you can see, I'm getting into the flat section. I hope the next 300 km aren't as flat as it looks. It really is hard on the legs and feet.

Glad I Brought My Laptop

Got my haircut, did my laundry, bought some shoes, argued with AT&T, tried to work out the Skype thing, talked to Mom and Dad and bought a map (albeit the wrong map).  Declaring the off day in Castres a success but looking forward to getting out of here. Very nice town but ... If you know what I mean

But I did have great wifi here so I downloaded three episodes of Better Call Saul and all of season two of Veep, which I'm about to watch on my laptop!

She Said It Couldn't Be Done

Sabrina, the B&B lady from last night was positive. It would be unthinkable for anyone to get lost doing from Bouisset to Castres.

As I pulled into the extremely quaint village of Cassounes I sensed something wasn't right. Where were the red and white way-marks?  I'll dispense with the excuses except to say that the morning was mostly through a logging region and there didn't seem to be many places for a way-mark. But it was all downhill like it was supposed to be and my shadow indicated that I was headed west.

Anyway, I ran into a guy on the street and asked him where the Chemin St. Jacques was. He gesticulated in multiple directions and motioned me to go inside his house. The wife and three kids heard the commotion and gathered in the front room. The man graciously explained that people mistakenly ended up in Cassounes all the time. He drew me a map which showed the mark that I had missed was five km back up the logging road and from there it would be another six km to Boissezon (the town I THOUGHT I was in).  He gave me a look of resignation and seemed to think that was the only option. His son, who seemed to be in his late teens spoke a little English and vetoed Dads conclusion. He insisted that I should take the main road to Boissezon because it was only six km from where we were. Dad concurred and drew me another map showing me exactly what to do when I got to Boissezon to pick up GR653.

The road was a little hairy so I went as fast as I could, and made it in just over an hour. I immediately saw the GR653  sign and headed down. After about 100 meters it became a fairly steep uphill for at least the next km. I say "at least" because that's when I ran into two guys with long distance backpacks and hiking poles coming from the other direction. One of them said "Are you coming from Castres?"  I said no, that I was going TO  Castres. "That's funny" he said, "So are we!".  The GR routes are marked the same way in both directions. I was on GR653 allright, but headed the wrong way. If I hadnt run into them I would have gone back to the turn I missed. The only mark would have been back to Bouisset, where I would have explained to Sabrina that she was wrong about it being impossible to get lost on the way to Castres. 

The two guys are the ones whose footprints I've been following for the last couple of days. I past them yesterday when they stopped earlier than I did. Dominic is the guy I talked to. He's French but lives in England. The other guy is Luigi. I'm guessing Italian. They only went as far as Boissezon today but our paths will probably cross again, so to speak. Even after 9.5 hours and 36+ km, it was a beautiful day to get lost.

I almost forgot that I got my first glimpse at the Pyranees this morning. Spectacular!  These two pictures are of that view (look closely) and of Cassounes - the village I didn't mean to visit.

Damned Mud

Mud is slippery, wet, heavy when it sticks to your shoes and usually appears after a big downhill and before a big uphill. Mud was everywhere today.

But it was a beautiful day for walking for the most part. I'm at a B&B, exhausted from trying to speak French. The lady and her mother are, as usual very nice. Dinner is in an hour.

I'm really out in the sticks right now. Dk the name of the town but it starts with a B. Actually I don't think it's a town, more of a crossroad with a big industrial shed. The B&B is fine although they put me through the anti-bedbug protocol of leaving my backpack downstairs in a garbage bag and only taking what I need up to the room. Most B&Bs seem to do that. I think this might be the last day in Haute Languedoc. The terrain today was great. Lots of rolling hills and nice paths for the most part. I expect it will be warmer starting tomorrow since I'll be out of the mountains. Very sketchy wifi here so I dk if I'll be able to check.

I'm probably over excited to get to Castres tomorrow. Even ordered breakfast at 7:30. It usually takes me almost an hour to get my act together after breakfast but I'm going to try & hit the road by 8:30.

Getting into Castres feels like I'm getting off Gilligan's Island. Here's my to do list so far.

- Get something to put on my feet besides hiking boots!
- Laundy
- Haircut
- Maps
- Call AT&T to whine about how expensive data is
- Add money to Skype account
- Call Mom & Dad

If I get wifi I may blog some pictures. Either way, happy Easter!

Yay Mud

 Mud means flat. Mud means no rocks. Mud means cool. Mud is so nice and soft and such a welcome sight I felt like flopping down and rolling around in it.

I don't have a problem with staying in B & Bs except when I'm the only guest there - which is every time so far. People are extremely nice but it's a lot of work for me. Just remembering everybody's name is hard enough. Last night it was Isabelle & Jean-Luc, the dog Nino, their friend whose name started with an M, and the awesome little 10 month old grandson whose name I never did catch.

I knew from my guidebook that there was an actual hotel in the town I'm in now so when Jean-Luc told me he'd call a good B & B for me I practically swatted the phone out of his hand. I told him I need the anonymity of a hotel every now and then and he understood.

It's 56km to a small city called Castres, which is the most populated place between Montpellier and Toulouse. Obviously I can't make it there by tomorrow. From what I've read most people take three days to get there from here but I've decided to make a dash for it. I called a B&B 28km from here and the lady can take me tomorrow for €35.  I'll do the same the next day and be in Castres Monday night. I just booked a room at a nice place there for two nights. Now I'll put together my "to do" list for while I'm there. 

Yesterday: Not As Expected

I knew this was going to be a big day. It's the second biggest climb of the whole 1000 mile route, and the last of the difficult terrain for awhile.  I left this morning at nine and was feeling great. After an hour and a half of a consistent but easy uphill climb, my inner dialog was going something like this.

Me:  "This is supposed to be a hard day but this uphill is a piece of cake."
Me:  "Yeah, right?  I'm almost a quarter through this. Damn I'm good at hills."
Me: "After this camino you ought to climb Mont Blanc."
Me: "Or Kilimanjaro. "
Me: "Yeah, Kilimanjaro. Hey Steve! Look at that rock. It looks like that red marble we were reading about in that tourist office pamphlet. "
Me: "You have a good eye for rocks my man. Let's keep our head down and look for more cool rocks. We'll find a couple of great ones and bring them home. "

I make it a point to find a place to sit down, drink some water and have a snack every hour and a half no matter how good I feel. Sensing it was about that time, I started looking for a good tree stump or something to sit down on. I found a good stump 10 minutes later but realized that I hadn't seen a red & white balise  (way mark) since looking up from rock hunting.

Figuring I couldn't possibly have missed a way mark, I kept going for another 15 minutes before reaching a downhill switchback it had signs and marks for several different trails. But none of them were for mine (the GR653). 

Me: "FUUUUUUCK!"
Me: "YOU ASSHOLE WITH YOUR FUCKING ROCKS!"

Still, how far could it have been?  1.5 km?  After backtracking for 45 minutes I finally found my missed mark.  What a disaster. One and a half of the first two hours had been spent getting lost and backtracking.  It took me three hours to get 4.5km from St. Gervais.

So it occurred to me that all 20of the challenhing km were still in front of me. I did what I could to recover by eating g an avocado, chocolate and an orange but never came back. I went another 8km or so and reached a spot with a huge rough uphill or huge rough downhill but I couldn't see a way mark on either of them. So I went back. If there was anyplace open to stay I would have because I'm not in a hurry. Every place was closed until Murat.

I ran into a forest ranger and somehow got her to understand my predicament. She called me a cab and I had a very enjoyable ride, arriving in Murat around 3:30. It was a beautiful day for a cab ride!

Oc

The word I was looking for was "oc", as in Languedoc. I didn't make this up. The Occitan language named countries after their word for "yes". 

St. Gervais sur Mare

The 13 winds were great!  Most of them seemed to be at my back the whole time!

Carrefour is a French grocery store chain and there are smaller ones called Carrefour Express. They're somewhere between a 7/11 and Whole Foods. They sell the greatest snacks. My new all-time favorite snack is Saupiquet Thon Sauce Mayonaise (tuna in mayo sauce). It's tuna, mayo, dijon mustard and finely chopped peppers. They come in single serving cans and I can't get enough of them. My rule of the road is to only eat them when there's a garbage can nearby and unfortunately there were no garbage cans on today's route.  And my pack still smells faintly of the empty sardine can I stuck in it two years ago.  I should have listened to the wisdom Dave got from the Maharishi about the garbage bags! Anyway, all I had for lunch today was a banana and an orange. I'm off to get pizza soon.

I'm in the municipal gite here and while it's very comfy and I have my own room, there's no wifi. I'd really like to show you some of the pictures from today but data charges are crazy this time around.

I've always been a believer that hills are worth climbing because of the views from the top and today really proved it. It was an 800 meter climb followed by a 700 meter descent but it was worth it. I think this was the last brutal descent for awhile; tomorrow is a thousand meter climb but the route stays on a plateau of the central massif for a couple of days before heading back down to the plains of Gers. 

I don't want to jinx myself but it's incredible how nice and helpful French people are, at least in these small towns. Most of them, even to y ones with populations of less than 500 have tourist offices. The one today called around trying to find me a Chambre d'Hote and when none were open, a random lady walked me to the town hall to hook me up with my municipal digs.

I have a quiz for you. I may have mentioned this in my now lost Le Puy blog a couple of years ago but I had forgotten this until I re-learned it today. Here goes:  in the Occitan language, if Lanquedeoui was northern France and Languedesi was Spain, what was their word for "yes" in southern France?

First correct answer posted in comments gets a can of Saupiquet Thon Sauce Mayonaisse!

The tourist office has wifi and although it's closed now, the lady gave me the password and told me I should be able to sit on the ledge outside and it will work. We'll see. Off I go.

Pass of the 13 Winds

I think the wind has died down a bit today. But today's track takes me over the pass of the 13 Winds. Off I go!

All Well

Limited internet.  More later.