Time Departed: 8.30am
Time Arrived: 2.30pm
Distance: 20kms
Cumulative Distance: 316 kms
Percentage Completed: 41% (535,600 steps)
Weather: Initial fog, overcast in morning, sunny afternoon, max 22
Accommodation: Le Mas de Ceres, Lalbenque
Feelings: Neil - Good, Henk - Fantastique!, Di - Happy
It was a flat walk all day and we took it easy. It felt like a lazy Saturday! The walk was mostly through dense small oak-treed woods surrounded by drystone walls. The region is well-known for its truffles which grow on the roots of oak trees and are harvested in winter. We came across a sign advertising truffle tours with the help of a dog.
The area around Limoges is also known for it dolmens and there are thirteen in the area. There was one located 100m off the track and we walked through the oak wood to see it. The dolmens indicate that there was a significant human presence during the Neolithic period. The area now is quite isolated and scarcely populated.
When we had morning tea at ten thirty three Australians passed us. Two, Col and Chris are from Samford and Pam is from Sydney. Most of the walkers we are meeting, and unlike the Camino Frances, are all in their fifties, sixties and some older. We did meet some younger walkers earlier in the walk but not now.
Each day we hear birds singing, especially the cuckoo, and for the past few days there have been crickets. We have also seen rabbits scurrying from us, yesterday a red squirrel running up the path and today Neil sighted a young deer complete with a fluffy tail just like Bambi!
Many very old, small stone huts keep appearing in the fields and some are built into the drystone walls. These stone huts were built by shepherds and some were built as dovecotes as pigeons were raised for their droppings for fertiliser. We also were walking on some old Roman roads today.
We passed through the little village of Bach where there was a hive of activity for a fun run later in the day. They also had a useful sign telling us the distances we needed to walk.
We decided we weren’t hungry enough at Bach and walked a further three kilometres to Vaylats and found a little bar. It was a perfect opportunity for a cold drink and to eat our quiches from the Limoges. The church bell struck one o’clock and I mentioned Prince Harry’s wedding as our time was one hour ahead of the UK. I went inside and asked the French woman if she had a television and she showed me that she was watching the wedding on her large screen computer. We sat at a table in the bar and in her limited English and my limited French we could talk about the wedding. She knew all the names of the Royal Family. We were soon joined by Aussies Pam and Chris and we watched the ceremony for about forty minutes until the connection was lost. It was good fun!
Our accommodation is a working farm in a beautiful, very quiet isolated area and there is no television. We had to leave the GR65 path and walk about four kilometres on a mostly unused path. Thankfully, Henk had put the coordinates into the GPS and we had no trouble finding it. I would not liked to have done it just using a map as a solo walker.
We are in a small stone house separate from the large main house which has a dovecote at the top in a tower. We had dinner at seven thirty at the main house. The saffron in our rice dish was from the farm. We also had Malbec, the local wine and Neil and I really enjoyed it.
Outside our house is a large stone-walled pond which has the noisiest green frogs. They sound like rasping ducks. A storm passed over at about five o’clock and the temperature dropped considerably and we are back into our warm clothing.
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