August 25: Mountains

 

Walking through Les Landes was a mental strain.  For six days, from Bordeaux to Dax, I walked through a dead flat land of timber, which resembled at most times more a desert than a forest.  When I read I would be walking through the forest, I was excited for a change of scenery, and a little tree cover in the 30 degree heat.  I love forest!  However, the economy in Les Landes revolves around timber, and you can see it in every mile.  Miles and miles of evenly spaced out pines, devoid of undergrowth, permeated by wide, white sand roads.  Sometimes the rows of trees turn into rows of cut down trees, and more miles of clear cut squares.  Around some of the towns I saw some more natural looking forest, but only in thin buffer zones around towns.  If somewhere else beautiful trails wind through Les Landes, unfortunately all I will remember is a long, straight, flat walk.

The effect of this flat, straight walking is that it is easy to feel like you aren’t even walking towards anything.  Like on a treadmill.  I lost the sensation that I was even hiking.  I was just going.  A few mornings the trail would wind merrily through a natural wooded area and I’d regain hope, but it wasn’t enough to redeem its blah-ness.  Other than that, there were a few hours of thrilling highway walking.  These 6 days I was going through the motions physically, but mentally I had to occupy myself in other ways.   I probably recalled every single moment that has ever happened in my life.  I probably thought about every person I’ve ever met, too.  If you’re reading this and we’ve met before, I’ve probably thought about you too.  There’s a lot of time for thinking.

This is why on the morning I set off from Dax my mind was probably already in another place, I was probably calculating the kilometers until the next town and converting them into miles and into time, when I rounded a corner and suddenly there were mountains.  Great big ones, barely visible in the distance through grey layers of clouds and haze.  But they were there.  I was so surprised, and so grateful, I nearly cried.  I smiled and clapped my hands and said, “yay!”.  I stopped and stared, and although they were far away I was utterly happy.  I felt a wave of joy like nothing I had experienced.  Suddenly it had hit me that I had actually walked towards something, and the Pyrenees were proof of that.  After hundreds of miles of sunflower fields, and vineyards, and flat fake-forest, there they were, the most perfect thing I had seen in a long time.

That day rolled out towards Sorde l’Abbaye along winding country roads, creeping towards the Basque Country, a landscape of green hills, and white houses with red shutters.

Today I went up and down for 21 miles, but I always had my head up, waiting to catch the next glimpse of the mountains which crept more clearly into sight.    I was also consciously aware that these are my last days in France, as well as the last days of the solitude I’ve grown accustomed to.  I’ve had three months of being a lone traveler, one which most people I’ve met consider “brave” to be walking all these miles alone.  Soon I’ll just be someone who is doing what everyone else is doing.  I’ve been looking forward to arriving in St. Jean Pied-de-Port, but now that I’m so close I’m sad my solo adventure is coming to a close.   Tonight over dinner I was anxiously worrying to myself about whether I should have taken the less traveled Camino del Norte over the popular Camino Frances, and then I was like, “Hey!  Stop worrying and go make friends!”

Because three months is enough time to be alone, and now it’s time for a different adventure.  And besides, my Camino is still my own, even if I share the road with others.

Pays Basque

5:30 wake up calls are harsh, but at least I get a sunrise.

Picking out my future houses along the way

solitude and meditation in a village church

St. Jacques de Compostelle

Love you boots, but after 1000 miles you have been replaced.

inside of my beloved, and retired, boots

 

 

 

So early, walking by moonlight.