We've now done six days of walking and have covered 90 km. We've finally developed a little "family" that is travelling along together - a part of the wonderful sense of community that comes with this kind of walking or pilgrimage. There's Sue and Polly from Tasmania, Jean-Pierre from Brittany, the four cousins (3 from Grenoble and 1 from near Valencia), two American gals (from California and Utah), Boston Bill, and others who come in and out of our path, sometimes only once or sometimes repeatedly. Sometimes we stay in the same accommodation or Gite d'etape, or we run into each other at coffee or at a bar (the usual place to go for coffee, food or drinks). And we participate together in the communal meals provided at the gite. These are always noisy convivial occasions - mostly a mix of English and French - with accents varying (Australian, Québécois, the French trying their English as well as the other way around). In this photo the host family ate with us. There's always lots of local produce too.
Wendy has had great fun chatting with some of the locals along the way. We stopped and talked to a shepherd who was moving his sheep to a different field. He had 300 there, and another 300 somewhere else. He only raises them for the meat and said that it costs more to shear each one than the wool would be worth. An old man with no bottom teeth asked me if I were German. When I said "no, I'm Canadian", he said - too bad because he could speak some German, but not Canadian! Also chatted with a very old woman who was out walking along the road with 5 dogs, but she explained to me that they weren't all hers but are needed to deal with the cows. It's obvious why there is so much good cheese here - as we see many cows along our route every day, and smell the "fresh country air" that results from the cow pies we are often walking through!
The meals at the Gite have always been in the same format starting with a soup. We have had a very tasty lentil soup, and veggie soup a couple of times and both quite watery. Wendy had a barley soup that was like porridge but with some garlic in it. The next course is a salad and most have been greens picked that day from their garden. We've also had a cold lentil salad with chopped hard boiled eggs, onion and garlic. It was nummy even though lentils have never been a favourite of mine. Next course is the meat course. I think we have had veal or pork every night with rice or mushrooms, often wild ones picked that day in the woods. The following course is a cheese platter and each cheese is "introduced". They all are either from the region or the owner of the gite's own cheese. My favourite is the old Cantal and Wendy is starting to enjoy the blue cheeses which she has always stayed away from. After the cheese a big bowl of fruit is put on the table or maybe a bit of a sweet. Last night it was a lemon loaf. We are amazed at how the French seem to be able to buy fruit meant to be served that day including peaches, nectarines, pears, kiwi fruit and apples, of course. A bottle of red wine is usually in the middle of the table and is replaced as needed. We have noticed that this local wine is served chilled. It's still very good so the old adage against chilling red wine doesn't seem to apply.
On to Finieyrols tomorrow, a 16km day. Hope we won't have to break out the rain gear as we did briefly today.
"Sometimes you will never know the value of something, until it becomes a memory" - Dr. Seuss
No comments:
Post a Comment