pocket-full-of-seaglass

-Les Estrets-

It was an interesting way to wake up, that’s for sure. Four strangers with entirely seperate schedules and ideas of decency. The man leaves with a rustle at 6.30am. I don’t realise. The woman turns the bright lights on at 7.00am on the dot. Fair play. My Parisian leapfrogger rolls over and goes back to sleep. My man.

I try, but it’s useless. I’m up. Trying to ignore the smells of breakfast, I get ready. I’ve given up on paying for French breakfasts; €5 to €10 for some bread and jam is not my kinda tune. Little lunch does not quite cut it for a day of walking – I’d happily shoulder a little extra weight in the form of food instead. Speaking of; I really need food.

I’ve decided today will be a slower day; I already know I’m going to stay in a gîte again. I know, I know, my poor frugality, it’ll be okay, breathe. It’s due to rain, and sure, it said that yesterday and it didn’t, but this time it’s already cloudy, and they look pissed. And, I don’t know man, beds are nice. Especially if you get them for a few euros more than a campsite – minus accidentally picking the worlds creakiest bed, last night was quite lovely.

My goal is to get to Aumont-Aubrac, get my food shopping sorted, and then figure the rest out. It’s due to break at four, so I’ve got loads of time. At 8.00am, I set out. It’s a nippy morning, and I’m shivering all the way out of Les Estrets. I can see the American in the distance, and I’m just following her. The arrows take you back out, across the road and to the right, where you pass the last few houses, turn left and go directly uphill for a few minutes. It’s rough, but it’ll stop the shivering; it’s real fucking nippy out.

Here, you’ll meet the rising sun and feel warm, then hot, then realise you probably should have applied sunscreen – but also you’re not going to stop until Aumont-Aubrac, skin cancer be damned. You wander along more sandy gravel paths up a few slopes, down more, passing lovely non-literal golden cows in the fields of wheat.

It’s a beautiful morning, if chilly, and, more than a slow day, today is about being nice to my knees. The poor things are actually worrying me now, so I’m going exceptionally slowly on every downhill. I refuse to get arthritis from anything other than cracking my knuckles, especially not because of something this stupid. So I’m taking itty bitty baby steps down the hill when I reach the first houses.

-Bigose-

Only a kilometre and a half from Les Estrets, Bigose is not BigNose, even though that’s all I can read it as. I’m 100% certain I’m mentally massacring every French town I come across, and I can prove it; I’m pronouncing Bigose like Stingos. Can almost guarantee it’s not fucking close.

Anyway, Bigose is cool because it has water and I’m totally not out again because I pay attention and am good at learning my lessons and also am an adult aware of my own needs. With that aside; I really need a drink. Naturally, water fountains are a zilch. At least, none that are directly on the path, because why would I stop, I’m not in Amount-Aubrac yet !!

I’ve still got half a bottle though, so we’re sweet. Just shy of 6km until town, and food, and everything else – better settle in. Out comes the music, on goes the mental scribbling; I tried to use the headphones and it felt so awful not being able to hear anything else, so I’d given up. They were reserved for late-night listening now, which worked great given that was the time I spent writing and that definitely required some tunes.

More Mumford and Sons, more Lumineers. I was on a roll goddamnit, and I was not getting off. Weirdly, even though I was intentionally not rushing, my pace bumped it’s way up to 4.0km an hour, what I’d been trying to achieve since I started. Probably a metaphor and/or lesson in there somewhere, but I’ve yet to master drinking water and not shitting myself, so slow down.

-Aumont-Aubrac-

I didn’t realise I was in Aumont-Aubrac for the first five minutes of being in Aumont-Aubrac, but I clocked it at the welcome sign. Master of perception, and all that. There were about twenty pilgrims all lounging around the local bar, knocking back orange juice and pastries, and the synchronicity was quite mesmerising. But it would not be my destination this morning – I was heading straight for the little cornerstore, Astromarkt.

Not only did they usually have some good little souvenirs, but hopefully they had cards. And they did. Not quite as cool as the ones from yesterday, but y’know <33 I grabbed a few other essentials; some tomatoes, haribo, a singular carrot, the usual.

After a brief shitty souvenir snoop, I left with a few overpriced trinkets. Perfect. My next stop: the local picnic spot – which turned out to just be a hill motorhomes could park on next to a bank parking lot. That works! And something crazy happened here; I had a bad pesto tomato sandwich. Something about it made me gag, the tomatoes all wrong. No no no, what was I going to do without my trusty sandwich??? Choosing to believe it was an isolated incident, I got some money out of the ATM, wrote a card in the very windy parking lot, and pressed on.

Completely forgetting the water.

Anyway! While recovering from my terrible sandwich, I had had a nose through my potential accomodations for the day, and landed on a little place in Les Quatre Chemins, ten odd kilometres away. It’d be my shortest day in a while, but my knees would thank me. As would my brain ; all I want to do is make a call work and do my taxes p l e a s e. The gîte yesterday had had no reception and it had not been too ideal.

So, fuelled with haribo, I continued on along the path. The arrows led me out along the main street, then sent me sharply right, up some more sandy gravel. It’d be my most ‘isolated’ day yet on the Podiensis, not that I knew it. But still, I saw no-one, so the music could play. I got a little too nostalgic, went through the playlist that seemed perfect in November, listened to songs that I could only ever associate with K’Gari.

That naturally inspired a minor spiral on my value in friendships and my lack of understanding of them; cheery shit! I’d essentially struggled with it forever; platonic companionship had always felt just out of reach, like I’ve been grasping at the air when it comes to meaningful friendships, phasing in and out of them. I struggle to maintain, forget to communicate, I drift. I was severely lacking in the friends department, and I really couldn’t tell if I minded or not.

Even now, in trying to figure myself out, I’d cut myself off from them; deleting everything off my phone and making it impossible for anyone besides my partner and immediate family to contact me. I guess I was still sort of seeing myself as seperate to everyone; I could be the person I am in relation to other people fairly easily, but I had no clue as to what I was like without the external pressure (however well meaning).

With those fiercely optimistic thoughts running ruin, I continued on till I saw church spires in the distance. At least I could spiral in the metaphorical shadow of the lord and the literal shadow of the church; it was hot.

-La Chaze-de-Peyre-

As it would transpire, the church belonged to La Chaze-de-Peyre, and was complete with toilets and potable water. Thank you, Jesus and/or residents of La Chaze-de-Peyre, pilgrims everywhere will thank you by,, pissing on the floor. Men </3

I had been planning on pausing, but I sort of just wanted to keep going, keep spiralling. It was sort of like a test run; usually when I get in little holy-shit-who-am-I-and-what-have-I-done ruts, I just distract rather than deal with it, but I literally had nothing better to do. Let’s see where this goes !!

So I shouldered the pack again, trudged forward. This time, for the first time, the arrows didn’t lead me to the church, but one street over. The pilgrimage ??? Not go to a church ?? What the fuck was going on ??

More confusing, given that I’d picked up the pack two seconds ago, were the houses starting to pass me by, and the chapel. What ?? Two kilometres go by like the blink of an eye if you’re Thinking, as it turns out. I went inside the chapel, and it was,, interesting. You could pay €2 to light a shitty candle in a plastic jar with a stretched image of Saint Jacques, our guy. Or you could just write in the funny book all the churches had.

So I did. Sampled, if you will. I never knew what to write, but I knew it wouldn’t be quite as religious as some of the others. I also knew my actual sentiments on religion probably wouldn’t be best received here. No cutting edge wit was granted to me today though, so I went with a generic ‘Good luck + Bon Chemin!’, signing it ‘Max from Australia’. I’d written in one other book so far, and my German roomie had recognised me from the Australia thing, so that worked for now.

-Lasbros-

Oh yeah, I was technically in Lasbros now. I couldn’t entirely tell where La Chaze-de-Peyre ended and Lasbros began, given that it seemed the only thing that separated them was about half a hill, but hey. From here, I had only four kilometres to go – just about an hour.

And it was a pretty hour. With water and a choccy bikkie or two, I was feeling way better about the state of the world – I could enjoy the scenery again. I’d missed most of it today, being mainly preoccupied with melodramatic ruminating. We were back in the New Pine Forest, where lichen covered all, and the trees were not so close together. Where they stretched, warped. Generally, they barely felt like the same tree.

It also felt more,, sparse is I guess the right word. They seemed to be more conservative in their pine-ness, broken up with golden fields of wheat. Also, was it wheat? It sort of looked wheat-like, but I also don’t think I’ve ever seen close up wheat. Does wheat just,, grow? Without being planted? The more I think about this the more I realise I think maybe it’s just a type of grass actually. When I have any sort of reception I’ll check, but my phone is still evil and hating me so for now it’ll stay wheat <33

There were also cows dotted in the wheat fields – no okay it totally was just grass right?? Like no farmer would grow wheat and put cows in it,,, right?? I’ve never felt less sure of a topic in my life and it is one that matters least in the list of topics-I’m-unsure-on. The clouds were getting real dark now, and I’m so distracted by the whole wheat thing that I almost walk straight past the gîte.

-Les Quatre Chemins-

From what I can tell, Les Quatre Chemins is a gîte and a cafe for pilgrims, and not much else. At least, not today; because the rain starts as I make my way indoors. Not much, but enough to get me to not go back out for a while.

Oh, and my host does not speak a lick of English – which would be fine, if I had reception for help from google translate. Unfortunately, I do not. Aahhhh shit okay. Eventually, we figure out that I did call earlier, and I do have a bed to sleep in. Thank god, because I am about ready to give out.

She shows me the kitchen, the room for my things. In France, there’s a fairly strict system in most gîtes to avoid bedbugs; in this one, you leave your shoes and bag (and walking sticks) downstairs in an isolated room, then put the things you’ll need in a little bin which you can bring up. I’m told to go up, get comfortable, have a shower and bring my dirty clothes down (for the last one, another pilgrim is enlisted to help translate). I go to pay for just a bed – then find out it’s demi-pension (dinner, bed, breakfast) only. Oh.

Okayyy, €40 as opposed to €15 isn’t g r e a t but I’m already here, I can’t exactly say n o. I’m assured there will be a vegetarian option, and with that I decide maybe this is the sign from yesterday, that I should take the demi-pension. Whatever, new experiences, right!! Right?? Oh god this is so scary.

The upside to being young though, easily, is that instead of ‘what a dick, coming to a country barely knowing a word of the language‘, the common sentiment expressed is ‘aah, youthful naivety, thinking the world will move to accomodate you‘. And, y’know, I’ll take the advantages where I can get them.

Showered and warm, I retreat to the room I’ve been assigned, scribble down some of the days happenings. There’s no internet (again), but I’ll figure something out. I can hear new people arriving; I know enough French to know ‘I’ll put you in this room, because the one in that one can only speak English‘. Not that that’s particularly a downside, but hey!

After a while, my lovely host knocks on the door, and in come two people. They smile at me, say hello. Hello. They’re a couple from Denmark, and they’re so fucking lovely – they essentially adopt me for the evening. One a teacher, one a pastor, they travel now (as she’s been retired since September 1st), and this is their second stage of the Podiensis, having gone from Le Puy to here last year.

They speak Danish, English, French, German, Swedish, Finnish and Italian – my measly English and German cower before them. We seperate until dinner, where I find myself asking to sit beside them. Thankfully, they indulge me. I’m not the only one happy about the arrangement – my host is thrilled. It’s very cute, how much she wants me to feel included.

Dinner is,,, dinner. My frugality isn’t thrilled, but I can confidently say that whatever the fuck the French do with carrots and beetroot is magic. It’s the starter, and it’s better than anything I’ve ever eaten. Give me that all day every day please my g o d. The main is veggies and rice, and it’s good!!! Everything is good!!! Just probably not an experience I need to repeat too many times. The cheese course is incredibly funny though. Just a bunch of cheese slices for everyone, sure. I take mine, terrified of it being bad but it’s actually quite delicious. Borderline cheddar.

Dessert is apple compote that unfortunately for my weak uncultured tastebuds is just baby food, but I get a mini ‘French lesson’ by the woman opposite me who tells me it is ‘DU compot DU pommes’. When I’ve repeated it a few times, she nods her approval. Sidenote, but here potatoes are ‘ground-apples’ which fucking rules.

I’m also one of two people under sixty. The oldies LOVE walking in France, and most of them are doing stages – like the Danish couple. There’s fourteen of us, and it’s a little overwhelming. They’re very sweet, and assuming the best of me and trying to speak French, which leads to a lot of sheepish apologies on my end and a lot of vaguely disappointed looks on theirs. It’s an odd dinner, but the Danish help me translate, and eventually the other younger person leans over and reveals they also speak English, which is nice.

Post dinner, I finish up and finally manage to call them, instantly forgetting everything. I think it feels like so much more is happening when I write it all down, but out loud it just feels,, small. Like written down, 2000km is a lot – out loud, I just walk. Weird little discrepancies and intense worry aside, it was nice :]

Sitting outside so I didn’t disturb people sleeping, wind whipping about, the storm on the horizon, coming ever closer. The hedgehog bumbling around, snuffling through the grass. Stay safe little guy!

And so I’m back again. Another day down, however many more to go – what am I going to do with myself when it’s over? I need to get better at Saying Things. I feel extraordinarily frazzled, and embarrassed for reasons I can’t pinpoint, and just generally confused. Words are hard, but writing makes so much sense. Sorry if it sucked today – I’m tired. Hopefully I’ll make more sense in the morning – I’ll see you then :]

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Day 23 – September 12th

Les Estrets to Les Quatre Chemins

17.1km

~ 100km total

€52

~ €139.63 total

(464.7 combined)

(€771.86 combined)