November 3rd.  Hagetmau to Sault-de-Navailles. 15.72 km.

As Ken and I were walking yesterday, we talked about the Via Francigena zoom call and about the purpose of our walking these pilgrimages. On the other two routes, the Camino Frances and the Via Francigena,  we had clear goals, at least in terms of getting from here to there, with arrival in either Santiago or Rome. Whether we walked for spiritual reasons, or the culture, or the physical challenge, or the social aspects, or all of the above, we have never been able to pin it down to any one thing as I believe it changes day by day and even during any given day. This trip is different. It’s been disjointed, whereas our other walks were straight uninterrupted runs with only the occasional rest day.  The end goal this time was to connect the two routes.

The dynamics are different – having Peter with us, then not, taking him back to Paris, having Scott alone with us, the canal trip in the middle, never meeting other pilgrims.  So we have days when we wonder why. but still…we walk.

Scott’s companion for night (the picture was huge) – Mr. Nutty.

Bird of Paradise.

Our bountiful breakfast. This was such an excellent place to stay, almost luxurious beds, kitchen with washing machine, such welcoming hosts, and of course Biscotte the Cat, who reminds us of our Fred.

Blandine and Biscotte.

Placing a pilgrim stone on the cross.

We have walked into the next province and there are clear differences. One, there are so many blinding white statues and two, huge crucufixes along the roads. We also saw many iron crosses in northern France but none in central France. We are starting to see them again. The Christian roots are deep here.

Saint Michael the Archangel slaying Satan.

Woof. Play with me.

Lunch stop by the local church and mairie.

October Rose still up in support of the fight against breast cancer.  Every village has done something.

We don’t know what these “missions” are. We’ve seen a few such monuments with different years.  We’ve also found it interesting that since leaving the Limoges area, we haven’t seen memorials to resistance fighters. And the cenotaph in the last town didn’t list any souls lost to WW2, only WW1 and Algeria.  This was unoccupied France and the route we are heading down would have been one of the routes taken by downed allied airmen escaping into Spain.

So flat.

Very unsociable goats.

Ok. Seeing a switchback sign at the bottom of the hill you are about to start climbing is never a good sign. You are a bad sign!

Chateau on the hill, which you can just sort of make out on the opposite side of the valley as I climb a switchback in the next photo.

We LOVE Camino angels (note that the geese are not the Camino angels of which I speak, although I am sure they are very nice geese! They just happened to be in the yard). We get to the top of the steep long hill only to find that a kind lady and former pilgrim had set up a pilgrim rest area in her yard, complete with hot water and coffee, tea and sugar, and an invitation to sit in her garden to rest.

This town is very neat and tidy, with people leaving pots on their windowsill to cool – I could have taken a taste as it was right beside the road. Even these little bunnies… They were right there and no one takes them.

Mailbox painted to look like a cow.

This van reminded Ken of the flashy boogie vans of the 1970s. Rock on!

Scott interpreted this sign to mean “Careful! Giant children in the road crashing into cars”.

You can just barely make out the Pyrenees in the background.

I snuck into someone’s yard to take a picture of their peacock mural. If they don’t want people sneaking into their yard to take pictures of their peacock mural, they shouldn’t have peacock murals in their yard. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it!

We waited by this church for our pilgrim host – he lives about 4 km from the Camino and comes into town to pick up pilgrims.

Our chambre d’hotes for tonight is in this farm house built in the 1600s, almost 500 years old, still in the same family.  It is owned by what we assume to be older bachelor brothers, in addition to running beef cattle.   Dinner was duck and pasta, and I just could not force myself to eat the medium rare duck. I was quite happy with the pasta but Raoul insisted on giving me a cooked but cold leek with a vinaigrette dressing. I tried but…thank goodness for Scott who helped make it look like we ate quite a bit. The brother was Louis.  They spoke no English but bonded with Ken over his 2CV (deuxchevaux) that he has at home.

What a cool newel post topper.

Our room was incredibly cold, actually  freezing, when we first got in but I couldn’t find anyone to fix it. Only when we went down for dinner. They have 2 more pilgrims coming the next night so hopefully it will be warm for them.

This was such a cool house and I wish I could have poked into all the nooks and crannies.  There are so many antiques and cupboards and forbidden doors.  A little different than the mobile home we stayed in  a couple weeks ago!