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Hi!

I think I wrote about having to carry our packs for 2 days due to a Gîte not allowing baggage transport. So. That meant 2 hard days of walking – 17 and 18 miles days. The stages were Conques to Livinhac-le-Haut and then to Figeac. Each night after arrival, shower, dinner, and planning the next day, plus looking ahead to where to stay, which now involves checking with La Malle Postale (the baggage transport company) to ensure that they deliver where we want to stay and THEN ensuring where we want to stay has availability – it was time for ibuprofen and bed! Right now we have the next 2 stays set. Walking lots of miles, but just with a day pack. Yahoo!

I’ll simply post some photos to give you an idea of the route and places.

Conques to Livinhac-le-Haut

The Abbaye St. Foy, where we stayed in Conques.

Dessert at the Pilgrim dinner. It was brought in to applause! Dinner with French speakers, so my ear was getting attuned and I got to parler français.

The stairway in the Abbaye gives an idea of the age of the building.

We had quite a bit of rain off and on throughout the day, but not pounding and not windy. It was beautiful! And we had some breaks, like during lunch:

And a break from the rain in this sweet Salon de thé where we had a deep dark chocolate torte and coffee.

The country home of the day. It’s tempting to think I could live such a life, and likely romanticized.

20 minutes from Gîte le Coquille Bleu, our home for the night. Claire, the host, bought an old house and turned the hayloft into rooms, the reception room is where the cows stayed, and she lives in the actual house where we had breakfast. She also recommended a place for dinner that serves gésiers (gizzards). They were absolutely delicious! Came on a salad. And a quarter carafe of red wine for me, 3 euros. Sleep came easy.

Livinhac-le-Haut to Figeac

I’m going to start with a few photos of mud – la boue. We hiked through plenty, including the day before, which was really worse than on this stage. Thanks be for poles!

I like the roughly hewn nature of this cross and left some of mom and dad here.

Somewhere along the way…a sculpture to recognize the Tour de France, which goes through here.

I marvel at a religion that has lasted for millenia and traversed the world. This image … sure would like to know more about it.

We took today (Thursday the 23rd mai) off and spent the day in Figeac. Changed from our Gîte of the night before to a hotel. Ed says we didn’t train enough for this journey. I reckon he’s right. Not that I want to admit it. But there sure is a difference between last fall walking and these first two days.

Here are a few photos from today.

Stolen Memory is both a memorial to the Jews and what happened to them, and a project to reunite personal items with family descendants. The panels describe the items and who they belonged to. Thousands of items have been reunited with family members.

This photo and the one above – parts of the original walls surrounding the city for protection.

Stairway. It reminded us both of the zig zag road in San Francisco.

Et voilà. I’ve been writing this in a place called Hop Hop Hop, a beer joint with great music. We met Caroline here for a beer. We’d met her and hubster Paul in the laundromat earlier.

Lastly, we had a wonderfully French dinner at La Terrasse, by the Celè River. Ed had a salad with a delightful assortment of delicacies: gésiers, thinly sliced duck breast (it resembled prosciutto, but darker and smoky), foie gras, and those crisp and thin French green beans. Mine was straightforward: cuisse a canard confit and pepparade. Here’s a photo.

Oh, dang! Next time, the photo first!

I guess that’s all, folks! It’s been great so far, and we’re confident it will get better!

Bonsoir!

bryade May 23, 2024 / 4:30 pm

I learned so much from your post thank you!

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div>Thank God for luggage service and I hope it’s availab

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Laurie Carleton May 23, 2024 / 6:06 pm

amazing

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Judy Lochrie May 27, 2024 / 2:28 pm

You read my mind! When I saw the duck bones, I thought “What?????”

That mud looks awful! Hope you don’t encounter more of it along the way.

The countryside is glorious. Thanks for the great posts, Paula!

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- pgsteele4 May 27, 2024 / 2:53 pm
  
  I do love duck confit! Thanks, Judy. BTW, pessary worked great on day 1, not so much since. Bleh.
  
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- pgsteele4 May 27, 2024 / 11:28 pm
  
  It has been enjoyable and beautiful and frustrating and tiring and energizing!
  
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