Day 38: Stage 32: Orthez

28.6 km, Sun & Cloud, 28°

Hot, But I’m Definitely Not Complaining! ☀️😎☀️🍻

A bit of a late blog post tonight. We couldn’t get into our accommodation until well after 5 PM. So now that all the chores are done I now have some time to write.

We stayed in a great place last night. Our hosts run a really good operation. Breakfast this morning was pretty amazing for two tired walkers.

We had originally planned on a very early start, but the temperature was forecast to be lower than we initially expected. It was still going to be a warm day but not an over 30° day. So we headed off at about 7:45.

The sky immediately grabbed my attention. I took a series of photographs this morning after we set off. It was an unusual sky and really enjoyable to watch it develop.

As the sky continue to evolve, we made good progress down the road.

I could see a tower being built on the horizon, and I said to AM that I thought perhaps it was a new radar installation. And that’s exactly what it looked like when we got closer. The last number of days we’ve been hearing French Air Force fighter jets all around us. I believe that France, like all NATO members, is beefing up its defences and observation capacities. I witnessed this happening in Italy the last two years, and I’m seeing the same thing occurring in France.

We walked through several small villages today. It always adds a nice cultural piece to the day. We are always on the lookout for a church or a City Hall (Marie) where we can find a stamp for our credentials. It’s just one of the daily things that all pilgrims do.

The church in this town had a beautiful rose window.

Another thing that we are always on the lookout for is a toilet for Annemarie. Another thing that most women on the Camino understandably keep an eye out for. You can usually count on finding one in every Marie if it’s open. The City Halls in these small towns often have very unusual hours.

As we travel further south, the irises are gone and have been replaced by hydrangeas which I am finding in three different colors.

We met this Dutch fellow walking towards us. We stopped and talked for a while and he told us that he had started in Muxia which is on the coast about 85 kilometres west of Santiago. He’s in the process of walking home to Holland and has just finished walking across the Camino Francis. We discussed the challenges of walking against the tide of humanity on that route. He will spend the next almost 5 weeks working his way towards Vezelay where his wife will meet him. He will take a week off there before walking onwards to Holland to complete his walk. What a great journey that would be!

Countryside here is very beautiful with ever higher rolling hills. We experienced more climbing today than we have since Annemarie arrived.

We passed another beautiful watermill today. It’s great to see these sorts of things along the side of the road. I find these experiences help to take me back in time. It’s easy to imagine what these areas must have looked like in mediaeval times, less the automobiles, telephone wires and paved roads!😊

In this particular town, we found the Marie open and we talked with a lovely woman there who was very excited when she found out that we were from Canada. I know that not a lot of Canadians walk this route, and it’s usually populated with walkers from the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, and of course France. So she was pretty pleased to find out that we were from Canada. She confided that she has wanted to go there for many years. Teenage kids are keeping them here right now, but they hope to go further afield once the two boys are grown up and have moved out.

We walked the entire Camino route today, and it led us off on some really pretty trails.

Even the roads weren’t too bad.

We did stop for a cold drink today, and of course Annemarie attracted the local inhabitants.😊 Cats are definitely not her favorite, which means that they almost always come over to check her out.

The kind lady that operated the restaurant and bar also provided us with some salted nuts which we gratefully consumed.

This was my view during our break. There were many large trucks rolling by because we were sitting beside a traffic circle which connected several major highways.

After our break, we walked along side the highway to a place where I had figured out that there was a grocery store. We went in and purchased Annemarie a sandwich and then walked on and found a quiet spot beside a stream to have lunch.

After one particular climb and descent, we again crossed a flat area before climbing again. Keeping those legs in shape!

Sometimes there’s a few challenges when walking along the back roads. There have been a lot of tractors these past weeks, which makes good sense given the agricultural area that the Vézelay crosses.

As we approached Orthez we passed more and more houses. No surprise.

Orthez has quite the vertical castle. I thought it might be a good place to house the pilgrims each night, but it was only a tourist attraction. I told Annemarie that I had no plans to climb to the top.

Orthez is a good size town, and has some really nice houses. The style of building is a bit different than other places I’ve stopped along the Vezelay. Really quite attractive.

We arrived just as school was getting out.

We took a quick tour of the town…

… before finding a place to chill out in the shade with a cold drink.

And that’s been our day so far. On the recommendation of our host we’re going to go look at a crêperie place for dinner tonight. We’ve been wanting to do this since we got together on this walk, and it may happen tonight! Photos will follow tomorrow…

Today was fairly toasty on the road, but you’ll get no complaints from me. I understand there’s more mud ahead, and we’ll see how that goes tomorrow.

This is actually a metal plate with a goats head that was screwed onto the side of a house. From this angle it could look like it was painted onto the next house, but it’s not.

Just three stages to go before the Vézelay is completed. It seems difficult to believe that over 5 weeks has passed since I arrived in Paris. I’ve generally found this to be the case on each of my previous walks. One goes through a daily repetitive process, but of course each day is different. I seldom know the name of the place or town where I’ve stayed the night before, and I rarely know the name of the place I’m walking to the next day. I often get asked where I started, and where I’m going to, but I often struggle to provide the correct answer.😂 Perhaps this means that I’m simply staying in the present moment, right?

For me, walking distance just becomes a flow of days and time. It’s really very simple and I find it to be very satisfying. So I might be a little sad to finish this walk, but at the same time I know that I will also be very satisfied.

We have made plans for after the walk before going home, and I will outline those shortly.

That’s about it for today. Time now to find our supper and have a little more of a look around this interesting town.

Bon Chemin!

Geoff🍻😎🚶‍♂️🚶‍♀️