Our Moveable Feats

September 18, 2024

From Estaing

Oooof, quelle journée, quel journey!

We’re supposed to be hardened to this by now, what with completing the mountainous stages, scarfing exquisite replenishment and a near-holy anointment!

Yet, today, our tenth, really brought the pain.

A pleasant outset, in the mist, again along the chestnut-lined Lot river, with only a sprinkling of associates along the way. We had a choice of 2 routes, one (supposedly) 18km roadside mixed with trails and the other, 19km purely countryside… roads aren’t so bad, right? Both had hills.

The panoramas remained sensational enough to ignore our below-knee irritation for a while. We took a couple of breaks to air the feets and top up our fuel tanks, as other pilgrims talked of their approaching gîtes. We started questioning why we didn’t book into Golinhac, Espeyrac or especially Le Soulié, as ours were creaking under the pressure!

Even 20 degrees felt blazing and, for the first time, we refreshed at every public tap / fountain. A camper-van lady extracted a small ransom for some kind of barbecue’d waffle and a flavoured ginger ale.

In our pre-delirium, the trees became macabre…

And strange creatures appeared:

A final rutted, rocky, uneven, dusty climb, and alongside the cemetery, into Sénergues to a most-welcome boutique hotel, with a view to soothe all the day’s small woes.

We hobnobbed well past dinner with a French-Swiss couple, which proved a relief, maybe an antidote to brooding!

Tomorrow is supposed to be… never mind!