Day 9 September 4 Saint-Come d’Olt to Estaing

24.4 km 728 ascent 795 descent 6:42 hr. 30⁰ C

It was a lovely breakfast, the granola was excellent. There was no meat or cheese though, for people like Russell who like that sort of thing. The staff was friendly but observant that you didn’t take anything that wasn’t for breakfast (even though they had lots of signs forbidding you to do so). I managed to get a tea bag for tomorrow, and Russell got a thing of jam for our peanut butter sandwich for lunch.

Russell and I seemed to be the first leave, at 7:30 am. There was going to be a lot of steep climbs today, and it was forecast to be 30⁰ C.

We exited through Saint-Come d’Olt, taking lots of pictures (our total for today was 50 pictures, an all-time high). We were walking along the river Lot, which had a strong current, with the water rushing over rapids, and it was bubbling, gurgling, and sounding tranquil the whole time. 

The birds were chirping too. Usually the animals along the way ignore you, but this morning, starting with the sheep and carrying on with the cows and horses, they were all staring at us as passed. One calf even came running over to the fence as we walked by.

Just as we came to the first major climb, we saw the girl from France we had dinner with last night. She was only going to walk on this week-end. We disappeared up the steep path through the trees climbing the mountain. 

Shortly up the mountain, we spotted two young pilgrims behind us, one of which had also been with us at supper last night. At first I thought he was with the French girl, but that wasn’t the case, he was another fairly young man. We asked if they wanted to pass, but they said no. It was a long steep climb, but still very cool and Russell and I are finding that we are indeed very well-conditioned from the massive amount of climbing we did last year on the via Francigenia. We reached a local maximum, then started a massive descent from that mountain, which was primarily along a road. When doing a massive descent along anything that has relatively good footing, I always jog down. It takes a lot of pressure off the calf muscles.

At the bottom, we started another massively steep ascent. This time we ended up at a volcanic crater, with very interesting basalt columns. 

First we descended into the crater, and then climbed out up to a large stone sculpture of Mary, at another local maximum. 

The two young male pilgrims arrived just as we were leaving. They took off their packs and looked like they were going to have a break.

It was a very steep descent along a rocky path through the woods down to the 10/1100’s Eglise St-Hilarion de Perse. According to legend the church is on the site where St-Hilarion was beheaded by Saracens during the time of Charlemange. The path was definitely not suitable for jogging down.  The way was strewn with hazelnut trees. Before we got to the bottom we went past a beautiful house, with a horse paddock under construction, and horses in the field with face protectors on against the flies. 

Also very content looking cows in the field beside. Very well looked after animals, I would say. When we passed the Eglise de Perse, which is a beautiful example of Romanesque sculpture, architecture and stone, a woman entered the cow pasture, and one of the cows let out a great moo – alerting all the other cows of her well appreciated presence – I presume.

We were now in Espalion, which appeared to be a very large and modern town. We wondered about all the pilgrims that headed there yesterday. Don’t you do the Camino to escape the modern world?

We missed one of the GR65 direction signs (a difficult thing to do, I admit) , and ending up walking through a sportsplex by accident. There was a group of kayakers assembling for a day adventure, tennis players, and a very large piscine. We noticed the two male pilgrims got ahead of us at this point, as we made our way back onto the route, with the help of the GPS.

We stopped at a restaurant/bar and had a coffee, then got two meat pies for lunch at a Boulangerie, as well as a prune tart, which we ate at the Old Bridge in Espalion, another one of the 5 cultural heritage items on that stretch of the GR65.

Leaving Espalion, we again walked along the river Lot for a while, then climbed up abit to a new Espalion bypass that was under construction. A bypass can render doom to a thriving city. We arrived at St. Pierre and visited the Chapelle St. Pierre that was built in the 16^th century but conserves a 12^th century Roman tower inside. 

We were able to visit the chapel and climb up the tower. It was a very narrow staircase up with very high steps. Easier going up than down, and very claustrophobic for me.

I then got a cold Perrier at a bar in St. Pierre, just before we did another massive climb. I also encountered the first European toilet to date on this trip.

We then climbed another path through the woods up to Briffoul, which had a microclimate and geology dating back 200 million years. On the way up I saw another of the translucent blue butterflies I had seen last year on the via Francigenia. Shortly after I saw another one, as well as a gecko. The two co-operated perfectly, by the gecko staying where he was and the butterfly landing close by, so Russell was able to get a picture of them both together. 

There was a descent after that through a very narrow tree cathedral running along a farmer’s field. 

When we first entered, I said what a great place it would be for an ambush. Shortly after, I heard what sounded like a pig and got worried there was a boar, but it grunted a few more times before emitting a great moo, so we knew it was a cow. Whew! There are wild boars around.

We then arrived in an opening where Eglise de Tredou was, with a picnic table and water. A Chinese girl we had met in Saint-Come d’Olt yesterday was eating her lunch. We sat down with her. She too, like the girl we met at the Paris airport, had studied in France, and had now graduated and was working there. She had started from Le Puy on Monday, and was walking to Conques, before going back to work. She was going to walk 16 km more today past Estaing, and then walk to Conques tomorrow. We take two days to get to Conques, after here.

She left the picnic table before us after lunch, but we passed her, and she got to Estaing at least 20 twenty minutes after we did. The distance from the picnic table to Estaing was about 5-6 km. She may have been 30, half our age. We felt pretty good about our fitness level after that.

When we arrived at Estaing we went to check into the hotel our documentation from Macs said we had a reservation at. I told the lady we were there for two nights. She said, ‘impossible, I am going to Toulouse tomorrow and the hotel is not open.’ I decided this was a Beppe moment and hauled out the telephone number of Le Pelerin, our tour organizer in France. She wasn’t the least bit interested in calling them. She made a few calls and told us we were staying at L’Auberge Saint Fleuret. I thought she said it was an older hotel, and 15 minutes up a hill on the left. Her hotel looked pretty nice, and I was feeling somewhat annoyed, especially since we there for two nights. We went outside, and I was parched from the walk and wanted a cold drink before heading off on a 15 minute walk up another flaming hill. I went back in and asked for a Perrier, and she said ‘we are not a bar, go to the Les Fleuret, the lady is waiting for you.’

Being the good sheep we are, we did as she commanded. It wasn’t much of a hill and it only took about three minutes to get there. It was an even nicer looking place! I think she must have meant her hotel was an older hotel. Anyway, all’s well that ends well. It’s a lovely hotel, a lovely room, and a lovely city. Unfortunately, it’s a Sunday and tomorrow is a Monday. A lot of places in France are closed those days. We will see.

The dinner was superb. A salad to start, veal roast, a potatoe pancake and fried spinach cake for the main, and a plum flan for dessert. Very nice.

We are both looking forward to a day off. Neither of really feel we need a day off, in the sense that we don’t have sore feet or legs, but would just like to relax for a day. This contrasts to when we did the Camino to Santiago, where after three days our feet were really sore. There is obviously a lot of conditioning from all the long distance walks we have done. I felt least prepared this year, but have had the least difficulty, so far.

Once again, touch wood, we have been blessed with no rain. It looked like it was going to rain the first day, but it petered out very quickly. There is no rain in the forecast for next week, either.