Day 9 Lodeve to St Martin d’Orb, 25 km

Another blue sky day with big hills and fantastic views. The day started early when the alarm of the guy who walks long days went off at 5:30. I did not get back to sleep. He was out starting his 56 km day by 6:00. The rest of us were much slower.

Quick breakfast (banana and kefir) in the gite. Bad coffee at the boulangerie across the street. And then out of the town and pretty shortly going uphill. I was worried about missing views by taking the alternate route today. But the alternate did not start until halfway along, after the highest point. The climbing was mostly on a small track and was a good surface. It was long but not terrible. Though the lack of wind (!!!) did make it hot. Then a good hour walking along the top with spectacular views to the south. At the turnoff for the variant, the main route goes northwest, the variant goes southwest. On a north-facing slope I was back in early spring. Deciduous trees with their leaves just starting to bud. Another great view.

Even the variant had a variant. I took the longer path that, I think, had easier walking and for which I had a GPS track. The other option was shorter, following a small river, lots of rocks. There were day hikers out on Easter Sunday. And a couple of groups of trail runners and a few cyclists. Tge most people I have seen.

The main etape ends in the very pretty village of Lunas. I met up with Benedicta there and we sat on the terrace of a fairly fancy restaurant and had a panaché (the beer and lemonade drink). Then we kept walking for another 4 km, which means we cut tomorrow’s 28 down to 24. Benedicta is staying at a different gite with one of the young women who have a lot of blisters - the other has gone home (not because of the blisters). I am at a private gite just at the edge of the village, right st the start of tomorrow’s hill, which will go to 977 metres or something like that.

By some kind of miracle I have a private room and I got to have dinner alone. And I was able to make a cup of black tea with milk! Very nice gite. There is a young Irish woman staying here too.

The plan is to leave earlier tomorrow! We’ll see!Read more