My Chemin de Compostelle--the Via Podiensis: Day 7: Finieyrols

I got up with the others and we all had a nice hearty breakfast. The younger ones and the four Swiss men set off early. I followed an older French man with an orange rain slicker covering him and his backpack, until I lost him somewhere after the Chapelle de Bastide. There had been an off/on misty rain when we left, and it continued just before Lasbos where I stopped at a wooden bus shelter to have a late morning snack. As I sat there, the heavens opened, and I sat there for a few minutes to wait out the rain. I continued on to Lasbos but was disappointed that the "open all year" gîte there was closed for 3 days (starting the day I arrived!) so lunch there was not an option.

I continued on to Le 4 Chemins and had lunch there at a small snack bar I had seen advertised along the way. The thin, older woman working there, a smoker, made me think of my sister, Karin, and I wondered how she was doing in the hospital...

Shortly afterward the chemin took a turn for the worse. The rain had made the path muddy in places, but worst of all, there were pools of water that occasionally had to be forded, and the path was actually closed with barbed-wire in two places. I managed to open one section, and crawl through another, thankful that it wasn't electrified as it had been elsewhere. I later mentioned it to the proprietor where I stayed and he went off to have a look himself. When I asked about the weather, he also said the rains recently had been worse than usual.

The Aubrac is a somewhat bleak and lonely place, with miles of grassy pastureland, grazing cows, lichen-covered stone fences, and barbed wire. I took many pictures of mushrooms, as mushrooms feature in some of the stone and woodwork of the region. I wish I knew more about mushroom identification and their varieties as hothouse ones we know don't hold a candle to wild ones.

By the time I arrived at Finieyrols I decided to call it a day. The rain, and subsequent slow walking because of it, had exhausted me. Although the main gîte was closed, a new place that advertised "chambres et table d'hôtes", La Rose de l'Aubrac, had opened up so I took advantage of it even though it was more expensive than the gîtes where I have been staying. The rooms are nicely appointed, and the food good, even though there is a steep staircase to get to the dining room. The hosts are certainly friendly and accommodating. I was amused that there was a Tripadvisor decal on the door and told them I wrote reviews for it.

I managed again to lose the data when I uploaded this so, again, no spiritual reading selection.