- Distance: 24.76km
- Ascent/Descent: 941m up, 473m down
- Time: 8 hr 8 min
Left our comfortable hotel at 9, nice overcast day, other walkers around. But oops, my phone bothered me about 15 minutes in, and said I left my AirTagged wallet behind, and I was thinking: side of bed? bed sheets? Under the bed? Sigh, dropped my pack and ran back. Today was the first day in both Vuori t-shirt and shorts, as well as my typical Hoka running shoes, so the 1100 meters back to the hotel wasn't horrible, and the Apple ecosystem professed to find my wallet in the shorts I was wearing last night. Fine, that AirTag is going in the waterproof bag next to my passport, not that they ever ask for that in France, and I'll carry it with me.
The first 10km were rather... bucolic. Fields, rolling hills, some cornfields, down along the stream (muddy), back up
to a road, and by noon we'd arrived at Ainhoa, one of the "most picturesque villages in France", sure Jan. Found a
bench--a luxury public good in this country--and ate our sandwich, leaving the apple sauce and potato chips for later.
Yeah, the village was cute, but sorry can't buy souvenirs or trinkets this trip, not that we would anyways.
The next part was worse, and we knew it: up a painful Catholic hill, one where old ladies walk on their knees past all the big white crosses, doing something demonstrative at each, a very public three Hail Marys and two our Fathers, at least God had fitted a grotto or three along the way with easy Virgin Mary installation shelves. (Question: why grottoes and caves all the time? Why can't the Virgin Mary also appear in a melon patch in the flatlands of Fresno, or a rapeseed field outside of The Hague?) Up to a chapel next to three crosses of the Jesus and his two accomplices or companions in death (why don't they have names?) and a chapel with lots of horse animals begging for handouts and sniping at each other. Some backpacker dude with AirPods and a manbun took off his pack, left it on the ground, and took pictures of the cross while the horseys slobbered snot all over his gear with their weird mouth lips. Ewww.
More hill climbing, but mostly following a track, one col, some contouring, more, then a long levelish bit, and finally the farm stay. Yeah, it's a farm, and the most basic accommodation yet, two double matteresses in a very tiled room and a bathroom that's best describe as functional. Oh, yeah, also tacked onto what sounds like the sheep shed. It was OK, a long day and that's all I really cared about, though I'd prefer fewer flies, but hey, it's a farm.
Dinner was kinda American breakfast: a cheezy omelet, fried bacon, fried ham. The keeper was very friendly, though.
We're both doing somewhat better than expected. Except for the soles of my feet today, nothing really hurts or is painful, though I'm rather stiff after sitting for even short periods. Chris has a bit of a rash on his upper arm where his shirt rubs.
So that's it. Bedtime came quickly, and we both slept soundly through the entire night.