I was at the bank opposite my hotel at 8:30 am, as a young lady was opening the shutters, to try to reclaim my bank card that their cash machine had cruelly sucked into its innards. With the use of Google Translate I explained the problem, however nothing could be done until the technician arrived to fill the machine. His arrival time was unknown and apparently unknowable, however 10 am was mentioned. So using my back up card I collected some cash from another bank's cash machine and checked out of the hotel, returning to the bank just after 10. The good news was the technician had extracted my card, the bad news was that the "Service" told them not to give it to me. Although I had already "frozen" the card in my banking App, and would shortly cancel it altogether, I asked them to destroy the card to ensure that it could not be used in any way. They cut it up as I watched. Cruel.
At least the matter was closed and I walked through the suburbs of Briançon knowing there was nothing more I could do. I thought of the atmospheric performance of Aladdin last night. Taking place in front of the city walls they used them and a three arched bridge over the defensive ditch in front of it to display coloured images projected through the darkness. There was much music and dancing and glittery costumes. The story was not hard to follow, I had seen Aladdin in pantomime as a small boy so knew the outline of the story, I even picked up some of the French.
My route today, as on many days, started with a climb through forest. This time it was not too hard. A gravel track took me gently uphill to the Chalet des Ayes where a "Buvette" served me a very good baguette of ham, mozzarella, pesto, cherry tomatoes and lettuce. On the way I passed rock climbers on a rather large cliff on the narrow valley I had been following. People on mountain bikes were also racing down the hill, or going up much more slowly.
After the Buvette, the narrow path that the GR5 now followed climbed more steeply, a rapidly flowing stream on my left somewhere. Trees enclosed my path until I broke out into open ground, with chalets dotted across a wide valley. After a little time on a gravel track I was onto a steeply rising path over rock scree with the Col des Ayes now visible in the far distance. Every so often I stopped, to catch my breath, look at the view behind me with the city of Briançon in the far distance, and drink some water. When was the last time I peed? Sweating profusely, especially now out of the shade of the trees I thought just a straight, slanted path to reach the Col, but a series of tight "S" turns were hidden that I still had to conquer to reach the top of the pass.
Once at the top, photo taken, I started down the other side, steep but not as bad as some days. I could generally stretch my legs out on the gravel paths to avoid straining my knees. Finally a road, cars and Camping de l'Izoard. The campsite, my destination for today was spread out beneath trees, the ground stony, difficult for the tent pegs to find purchase. On two sides rocks rise up to enclose the bowl of land on which the site lay, on another there was a steep forested hillside. The campsite served a simple evening meal of ham, cheese, olives and bread. It reminded me of when working in Ferrol in Spain. Sometimes we would visit a bar where they would serve ham and cheese with red wine. The hams hung from the rafters of the smoky bar and the labels on the wine bottles had General Franco's head on them. Unlike today, after eating they served home made liquors from bottles without labels. On returning to my tent, I found a swarm of flies had taken residence between the inner tent and flysheet, they are buzzing around now, why do they like me so much? Maybe punishment for killing a number today, especially the clegs who were after my blood. Not all insects are quite so unpleasant, there were miniature orange and brown butterflies on my walk today, and red and black winged insects extracting nectar from knapweed.
No comments:
Post a Comment