Day 13 to Boisset, 30 km

La Salvetat-sur-Agout to Boisset

Long, beautiful day to a gite a little ways out of the village of Boisset.

I finally managed to get out the door before 7:30. Quick stop at the boulangerie for a pain aux raisins, which is way better than it sounds. Gloves on and hood up, it was chilly.

Leaving Salvetat this morning was a mess. GR markings are leading one way, the gps tracks on not one but three apps are leading another way. I assumed this was another case of one village with two different GRs. But then there were no markings at all along the route I was following. Eventually I caught up to Florence who figured out they have moved the GR, presumably to get it off the road . Traffic was not bad this morning and I think we were early enough that walking on the road did not seem dangerous. The new route looks like it might add a few kilometres. I was happy not to have them.

Most of the walk was through plantation forests - beech and maybe hemlock? No undergrowth, no middle story. But the shade was good. At home we talk about hiking on trails that are all rocks and roots. Here it is rocks and sticks. Every so often these trails are just covered with sticks, which, of course, sometimes roll when you step on them. They also make the trail feel messy.

I had just been thinking that I have seen no small animals. But then I did — something that looked like a mink but maybe bigger and a deer. And then later when I was having a croissant on a bench, a mouse came for the crumbs. . Coolest thing today was a weird plant that the internet says is purple toothwort, a parasitic plant that grows on the roots of other plants and has no chlorophyll. There was just one clump. Oh, and I finally saw a menhir, a standing stone. (Yesterday’s gite was Gite L’etape les Menhirs.)

Quick stop in Anglés, a drab village, for a croissant and a cold drink from the supermarket. There were unlocked public toilets behind the village hall, which does not happen that often here, unlike Spain, where they are everywhere and mostly very clean. These ones were the hole in the floor kind, which, thankfully one does not see that often any more.

Lots of the houses in Anglés have outside walls covered in thin slate tiles. Apparently, it is to protect the house from humidity or moisture.

Leaving the village there was a great chorus of frogs. And then two more hours through the forest. The last section of woods actually had a bit more diversity it.

Lots of info panels here about US paratroopers in the area in WW2. Honestly, I was so hot I didn’t read them but I took pictures for later. The woman who owns this gite has a sign up here too. She said the family of a paratrooper who stayed (I think) in this house came to stay recently.

This house is beautiful in bucolic surroundings. Lots of animals. Goats, sheep, cows, weird beauty queen chickens and normal chickens, a bunch of cats, some dogs, two donkeys. There is a dog agility course in the back, and the woman’s daughter runs a pet sitting business.

Two rooms, three of us. I got to have the room with the double bed. Age? Language? Maybe also Florence just being nice. She arrived first and took a bed in the other room. I did not argue; this room is beautiful. As they say on Escape to the Country, it has a dual aspect.

Tomorrow I am going to another rural gite that is a few kilometres off the chemin. It puts me closer to Castre on Saturday. I think tomorrow is about 20 and then Saturday will only be 12.Read more