After a leisurely breakfast we set off with the usual stop to buy the stuff for our lunch. We then had a choice of route to the next town of Espallion, either following the GR 65 and going via the statue of The Vierge Notre-Dame de Vermus which entailed quite a steep climb or walking along the side of the river Lot. As we worked out the total distance for the day was 24km we decided to go via the statue of the Virgin,
yes the climb was steep but the views from the top were absolutely stunning looking back over St Come and forward towards Espalion and beyond.
When after a steep decent we got to Espalion the GPS recorded that we had done 2 more km's than the distance mentioned in our guide book. This is a phenomena which has kept on occurring, the book says one distance and the GPS records a higher figure. This is something we keep on forgetting when setting our goals for the next day and consequently we have covered more miles each day than we planned. Hopefully by the time we hit Spain we will take this into account to shorten our days, otherwise we will get to Santiago far to early with bodies in a state of meltdown.
Anyway back to the day:- On the way down from the Virgin I discovered that one of my pockets on my rucksack had come undone and that the ferrules for my walking poles had fallen out. At that point I should have prayed to I think it's either St Jude or St Anthony (a saint who assists when things are lost, (send us a post if you can let me know which one it is)). Instead I just got cross with myself and stomped into Espallion at high speed. I then noticed an outdoor shop and in my best pidgin got some new ones, as I reached for my wallet to pay and the shop keeper tried to find the price I found my lost ferrels. But how do you explain all this to a French shopkeeper in pidgin? Thankfully Lesley as at hand.
EspallionWe carried on our way stopping at the church of St Pierre-de-Bessuejouls one of the oldest churches on our French leg of the trip.
Where we stopped and said morning prayer. We then stopped at a tap for some water and bumped into Jean-Mark who joked about us needing beer and not water. What came next was one of the most vicious uphill stretches we had encountered so far. At the top again we were rewarded with fine views over the country side before our next decent.
In the afternoon we dropped into an arable area, our first since Le Puy, where they were harvesting sweetcorn using one of the strangest machines I have ever seen.
Before long we were walking alongside the Lot again overlooking the wonderful town of Estaing,
where most of the pilgrims we knew were probably stopping, but we had a different game plan so after a quick Oringina, we headed off again, to our final destination at Fonteillis. What we hadn't done was read the book properly! We had 7km of hard walking uphill all the was with one or two very steep sections most of it on tarmac. The wall was there and I nearly hit it, that point where I could go no further. But round a corner we spied our destination a caravan site and gite at the top of a hill. We were shown to a mobili or small mobile home which we shared with Yohanis the German Swiss chap we met last night.
At 7:30 we went to the gite for our meal, and sat around talking over aperitifs while we waited for two other guests who never turned up. Eventually we started and probably had one of the liveliest conversations over a meal so far, as two of the other guests where a young newly married French couple, who work in Finland and spoke excellent English and were happy to translate for us when needed.
On the Camino
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