Day 9: Stage 7: St. George-sur-Arron

31 km, cloud, sun, bit of rain, 8-12°

COURAGE❤️!

I promised photos of the Bourges Cathedral. I have very little bandwidth today which means that I may have to post this stage tomorrow.

This is one of the reasons I elected to walk this variant. In spite of the lack of well situated beds, I had read that this cathedral was worth the challenges.

There are two huge block spires. The second one is under renovation so I’ve tried to crop them out of my photos using buildings.

The entrances have been cleaned and restored.

Quite detailed and beautifully done!

The inside is huge! One of the claims to fame for this cathedral are its stain glass windows. They are quite spectacular. I arrived on a Sunday late afternoon on a rainy day, so the windows did not light up the way they would have on a sunny day. However, I felt fortunate just to be able to take the time to be there and enjoy the experience. I was able to get a stamp in my credential, and the staff were kind enough to lock up our packs in the office so that we could enjoy wandering and lingering without being weighed down.

A series of photographs;

I’ve pressed my luck with this wifi. I’m staying in a very rural village with 3G and poor wifi as my options. Posting this takes patience (my strong suit😂), but this should happen.

The city of Bourges is really interesting with a central medieval core that made me feel like I was on The Three Musketeers movie set, except it was too clean. A few examples;

So on to today. I stayed in a very basic accommodation last night. Very😑, but it did have a wall a/c heater which allowed me to dry my clothes😊 I was only there a few hours and grateful to have a place to sleep.

I was up early and out the door thinking that I’d find a place for breakfast, but I guess no one opens their doors around 7:00 so I walked out of the city thinking that I’d be able to get something at the grocery store in the next town some 8 kms up the road. No problem. I’ve done this a hundred times before.

I found my way to the next town and navigated to the grocery store where I filled up the remaining room in my pack with groceries. I needed to have food for dinner tonight and a light lunch today. I was also looking for a bit of trail food and found some dried pork sausage which turned out to be a great find! This probably sounds like small things, but when you’re walking this type of route and kind of living moment to moment, it can be the highlight of my day. There are no cafés, bars or restaurants typically available on this route. This is not like the major Caminos in Spain, Portugal and elsewhere. It’s very basic. For me, there’s something very satisfying in the simplicity of this route. That said, things had better improve a bunch on that front before Annemarie arrives!🤣

As I walked along munching on my two pan aux raison pastries. I made the decision to get off the highway and walk the full route today. Much of this stage was on the highway, but I was sick of walking roads and decided to chance the forest trails once again. I’m always happiest walking on these trails. Turned out that they were extremely muddy and very, very wet. However, I was still happy tramping through the guck!

As I navigated the muck I started thinking through a haiku. Often my haiku are pretty basic, but occasionally I find some satisfaction. Today’s wasn’t one of my best, but it was applicable.

It’s all a puzzle
Walking through a muddy maze 
A joyful process 

Occasionally I would break out of the forest and along the side of some farmer’s field. Still muddy, but at least I had a view.🙂

And can you see that blue sky? How exciting is it to see blue sky after all the rain, right?

And then I found myself back on the somewhat busy highways the rest of the stage, but I had had a little joy for a while. I’ve learned that there is always beauty to be found even in the most unlikely places. Walking the highways isn’t the most fun thing in the world, but if you look for it, there’s eye candy everywhere!

I eventually arrived in Charost, a notoriously difficult place to find a bed! Prior to most walks I scan the route looking for possible trouble points. This was one of the ones I identified on the Vezelay. I called every possible location where there might be a bed within a 5 km radius of this town, without luck. Annemarie, thankfully found me an Airbnb❤️ in the next village which has only been open for a very short time. It’s not yet in the guides or on Google maps, and while fairly basic, it will do just fine (I’m sitting here now).

I had mentioned this trouble spot to other pilgrims during the last several days, and to the best of my knowledge no one has been able to find a bed in this area. This means that a person would have to walk over 40 km to find a place to sleep in Issoudun. I love that name…it sounds so much like a place in Middle Earth (LOTR). I considered making the long trek to Issoudun, but I’m glad this place showed up. Some of my recent acquaintances were discussing taking the train across this 70 km stretch.

With considerable patients, I have managed to get this blog post completed. I must admit that I’m quite surprised, and pleased to have finished this. It’s a tough enough process trying to write a reasonably useful blog post after walking a long stage. It’s less joyful to have to do two!😎

I’ve looked ahead at the alleged weather forecast, and it’s looking rather good! Finally! I’ll soon be walking in shorts and a T-shirt and in my happy place with my dorky hat.😂 I’ve finally found a sunscreen that I think I might be able to wear, but since arriving here my supply hasn’t dwindled at all. I hope to change that in the coming days.

It’s now almost time to make my supper. A real gem tonight and a favourite from my walks in Italy.

Bon Chemin!

Geoff 🍷🥫🍝