Today mostly involved getting inadvertently adopted by two animals: firstly by a campsite cat that followed us to our tent last night, charmed us, became a purring machine and then refused to leave no matter how many times we put her out. So it was a cosy night in Colin, in which the cat took up much of the foot room and totally ignored the meaning of a two man tent; secondly by a very friendly dog of ambiguous ownership who followed/led us out of town and onto the GR10 and refused all attempts to be parted from us for over 3 hours. We didn't encourage him at all and were really worried but he definitely knew where he was going and had no ID. Then we met a lady who owned the local gîte d'étape who recognised him and said lots of stray dogs in the area do the same thing with hikers. She tried to lead him back to town on a lead but he escaped and carried on with us so she told us to look out for a lady at the next col who could help – and sure enough we found her and she immediately started calling up friends to see if it was their dog (it wasn't) so she took him in to either return him to his owner if she could find them or to take him back to town and investigate further. He liked her a lot and we were happy that he had someone to look after him – definitely no space in Colin for a huge white dog no matter how friendly! Then there was a tiny frog, many many sweet chestnuts ripe for foraging, a convoy of hunters driving down the track with their bloodhounds and two dead deer in their truck which made me so sad and angry :( steep paths in the sad woods, wind rustling through the trees sending down golden confetti flake leaves as the forest glowed in the late afternoon light, good views of Canigou and rows of mountains fading into the hazy horizon, a perfect red spotty toadstool, conflicting feelings about being almost finished (I can't wait to reach the sea. I don't want the adventures to end), lots of careering down helterskelter hills, many cols and a march along a D road at the end as the light faded and we reached a free camping spot where an owl hooted and all the village dogs howled as we dined.
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The vital statistics:
Total hiking time: 10h 44
Peak: 1414m
Total ascent: 2025m
Total descent: 1772m
A peaceful morning in our deserted campsite, another stomp along a d-road, this time blasting out some Led Zeppelin to motivate our tired legs, flowery villages, turning back onto the GR10 (E branch), vertical forest paths that eventually got flatter, nostalgic pink flowery aromas filling the air, a sizeable wedge of brebis for lunch and bounties for snacking, an aquaduct/leat flowing alongside us for a while like a mini canal, a stupid electric fence blocking the path, arriving at the étang de Bethmale where we wanted to camp to find it chockablock with fishing people (a shock after not seeing a soul all day) so carrying on up through a steep forest, over a col onto the GR10 (D branch) past unreal skies and into another forest that was so thick with cloud it was prematurely dark, finding an unmanned shepherd’s cabin and settling in by the fireplace while rain drums down on the tin roof...
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| La Cabane de Luzurs |
The vital statistics:
Total time hiking: 7h36
Peak: 1414m
Total ascent: 1128m
Total descent: 437m
Sleepy forest mornings, paths that went up instead of down but then zigzagged peacefully under pine trees for an hour, arriving in Fos, the village that promised much (a shop, a restaurant, a campsite, a bakers, a hotel) and delivered nothing but an eery deserted gîte d'étape where we spent a weird hour waiting; nobody came except a Belgium hiker who was equally confused so we left money for the coffee we had made and continued on to the flowery village of Melle in the sunshine and found an amazing auberge with friendly owners who fed us very well and gave us local bivouacing secrets courtesy of their collie
The vital statistics:
Time spent hiking: 5h30
Peak: 1293m
Total ascent: 314m
Total descent: 862m
Feasting for breakfast, wandering through Gavarnie, urban marmots on the outskirts to show us back into the hills, a red squirrel, a swallowtail butterfly, a cooling breeze making the golden grass dance and keeping us cool as we climbed up the side of a mushroom covered mountain, the Cirque de Gavarnie ever-present and ever-epic behind us, good coffees at a gîte, lunch in the shade before the path suddenly became a scratchy gauntlet with different thorns on either side and scarlet red grasshoppers leaping about, descending into a glorious forest with sunbeams dancing through the leaves then descending again into lightless, viewless, soulless, stony, awful goblin tunnels down to a D road that was as hot as it was long, terrifying scarecrows and posters advertising local cake (I've never been more terrified at the prospect of cake), songs to spur us on blasted out of my phone before finally arriving at a campsite where we are camped by a 12th century castle and have eaten like kings. A very long day!
***
We stayed in this campsite, the Camping Toy - very central with views of the castle across the river
This pizzeria, Che Coulet, in Luz-Saint-Saveur was so good we ate here twice.
The vital statistics:
Total hiking time: 9h30
Peak: 1825m
Total ascent: 866m
Total descent: 1475m
