Day 18

Argonon to Navarrenx 24 km

We saw the Pyrenees in all their splendor for the first time today abd we will ve walking toward them till St Jean Pied de Port

We are in a gite called the cri de la Girafe, we are three pilgrims, the same one for the last three days. His name is Jean Marc and he is from a small village near Cannes. He is not sleeping well, we think that he has a lot on his mind and he arrived at 1:30 while we arrived at 3:00 but we stopped  four times to eat and rest, obviously we are not in a rush

The views were spectacular, going from valley to valley, either on flat surface or going up for a long time, but what goes up must come down, and the descent were long. The forecast was rain but tge BOYS were there no rain till 6:00 while doing groceries for the next two days because tomorrow 19km of nothing in between and same for the following day going to Ostabat

A vietnanese pork belley name Rachel

She is ready for the night 

The English Chambre d’hote where we stayed last night

The alley when leaving our gite this morning

Walking up a hill we could hear cow bell, our fertile imagination decided that it could be sheeps, may be cows, may be goats, but to our surprise they were horses with their babies

Mama and baby

The Sauvelade and its abbeyee, closed for repairs

All the comfort for lunch in the middle of nowhere

Place where we stopped and had all these writtings along with the couch

Also a swing

The Pyrenees in the background and a corn field

The Pyrenees in the background and we had walk around the building in the backgroung

The road we walked on, corn on both side

Our gite has lot of girafe

Pub where we had our beers

Mountains very impressive and we think there is snow on top

Day 17

Uzan to arganon 22km

Arriving to our destination, this sign was posted and we had a good laugh

Almost a Canadian cabin!

Beautiful house

First building with solar panel

Beautiful tree in bloom

The flower bush behind us was full of all kind of flowers

The plant in bloom

One of the dog in our gite today

Typical house of the region

Last night we were 3 pilgrims and tonight we are the same 3. Our gite is run by british man and his mother, they have a limited french vocabulatory

Last night dinner was the worst we dinner weve had. Soup lots of liquid some cabbage plus a sliver of potato. The main meal was one sausage each with canned green beans plus a green salad with one tomato cut in many small pieces. Dessert was 2 slice of cheese and bread. We were offer 1 glass of wine. Oh i forgot a glass of water

The walk was easy and for the first time had a glance at the Pyrenees, very far in the distance and smog of the last few days. The heat wave is over, nice and cool during the day and showers forecasted for the rest of the week

Day 16

Aire sur l’Adour a Arzacq-Arraziguet on a fait avec baggages transport, one hour. 

Arzacq a Uzan 15km

Very nice walk, weather has change completely, now in low twenties and no sun, same forecast till end of week with some showers. We are now finish with bus and transport with baggage, will walk to St Jean. 

We are told that on a clear day we can see the pyrenees, but with the heat still lots of haze. 

We are now in the Bearn area and it is no longer flat, nice hills not too difficult but lots of road walking and my left foot very unhappy, no more blister except for MarieClaire’s little toe, it keeps coming back

Moulin de Souvigny

The pilgrim’s tree

Sunflower field in bloom

Looking across 

The Moulin de Louvigny

We can imagine Henry IV galloping in the forest checking his territory. He was the King of Navarre and was from the Bourbon House.  

Day 15

We are having a day of rest. We are taking a bus to Aire sur Adour for two reasons, one there are truck races this weekend in Nogaro and very difficult to find accomodations and second because we have at least 3 days of 31 km and we wont make it to St Jean by June 29, we will also take one day of Transport Claudine, they take baggage from one place to another and they also take people. 

Cafe de la Paix a Eause where we slept last night. We were told it was the home of Henri IV’s mother and he spent some time there

We tried some Armagnac after dinner

Vineyards

Yesterday path along vineyard

One if the places where we stayed

Day 14

Montreal du Gers to Eauze 15.9

Very easy walk to Lamote was in the forest on an nice path and pretty flat. Stopped for our break had a cold drink and continued to Eauze and got here at noon, we followed an old railroad track, very flat. Saw at least 11 pilgrims, most we had never seen before

Found our gite and because it was a Cafe/Resto they were very busy we had a beer went to our room 2:00, had a shower, wash our clothes, laid down for a rest and woke up at 5:45 and dinner was at 7:00 a descent hour, while waiting another beer, in the shade here was 32C

Our gite included 1/2 pension and dinner was a pizza and dessert or confit de canard with dessert, we chose one of each, was delicious with a nice wine of the Gascogne region where we are at the moment. We are also in the region of Alexander Dumas three mousqueteers 

We are in Armagnac le Bas area where they make the Armagnac liqueur. After our dinner we decided to test the Armagnac, the one we sample was 30 years old, was very strong, and we were happy to try once and will try something else next time

Sorry cannot do pictures, it eats the battery and then it dies and i have to delete manualky, easier to do with email

10:00 and ready for sleep

Day 13

Castlenau a Montreal du Gers 22km
Today our plan was to walk 15km, our gite was to open at 3:00. For the first time we had breakfast at 6:15 and left at 7;45 and arrived at Condom at 8:45, 9km later. we only had 4.6 to our gite, we decided to cancel our reservation and make another one for Montreal du Gers, the man was not very friendly, did not offer demi pension, only breakfast and the bed was a double one,also the gite was at the beginning of the village, but he said that there was some resto in the village,i said ok 

Had a great walk, on the road, beautiful paths in forest, all together we saw 8 pilgrims, 4 stopped in Condom, one couple from Lyons were too tired to go to Montreal and the other Italian couple went directly to the urgence in Condom because his fert were a mess, 1 was walking to Le Puy, 2 we met last night, a young man from England that is Spanish born who had been walking with his mother and she left yesterday morning to return to Spain and a frenchnan living in Martinique plus of course us two. 

We thought we had 24km to walk so at our last rest we thought we had 4 km left, there was a beautiful table with 3 chairs the invitation was there so stopped and rested. I decided to look into our guide book to see where the gite was, and found another place that i had not seen, that was a hotel/retaurant so we thought great we could get demi pension and did not have to go and hunt for our meal. So cancelled the reservation at the gite and made the new one. The lady on the phone was tres sympatique and she said call when you get there and she will come from the resto, i said we would be there in one hour. 

So put all of our gear on, and we had wings, and the gentle pushed us toward Montreal. To our greatest surprise 5 minutes later the sign said Montreal du Gers Bienvenue, Village Fleurie de France and 10 minutes later we found our hotel. 

From Condom to Montreal there was nothing, no village, no resto, nowhere to get water, so in Condom we went shopping, bot a cucumber, bread, cheese, 2 nectarines and a small cantaloupe. We were stingy with our water because we wete afraid we would not have enough. Eh bien the boys provided, near a house there was a lone table and in the middle a jug of water, needless to say we each filled our bottle

So as you can see we are well provided by the boys today and to add to all that, a thing rather unusual, air conditioning. At 3:00 pm it is 35C in the shade, my guess in the sun probably above 45C

Day 12

Lectoure a Castelnau sur l’Auvignon Beautiful day of walking, looks a lot like Tuscany, lots of culture artichokes, wheat fields, corn and other cultures that we are not sure what they were.

Staying in a Gite that the owner speaks many languages. Did not take many pictures because they would look like fields or forests and already have many pictures of them

Today took a short cut and we found that the signage was not very good and effectively we did a few extra kilometres for nothing and one pilgrim told us to go ahead and we would find the way, he was going to Condom and that was not our destination, so we turned around and found where we were supposed to go, no sign saying Castlenau but the owner insist that there are, we will see tomorrow because we are going there.