The clocks went back overnight and we had an extra hour this morning.
We woke up just after 7am which is the new 8am so we’re still waking up at our usual time. We got up slowly and had breakfast, watching all the Halloween revellers start to head home. We’ll be Billy No Mates tonight.
We decided to follow a walk that the reception gave us yesterday – only about 6 kilometres all told, but it would be nice to stretch our legs and with the sun shining brightly, it should be a lovely little stroll. We took a flask of tea and some nibbles in case we fancied a picnic, deciding to follow the The Three Hermitages route to La Verge de l’Abellera.
We walked out of the campsite and into town on a little back road and followed the instructions on the leaflet. It was in English and French, with the English not quite translating as well as it should (can’t vouch for the French). At one point, we were looking for a “raft”, but luckily the route had signposts as well so we only had a couple of headscratching sessions.
Finally we came to La Verge de l’Abellera, hidden behind a wooden door. The small church/chapel was built on the edge of a sheer drop and under overhanging cliffs with fantastic views across the valley and wooded hillsides. We read the information boards and sat down for a quick sip of tea and a biscuit. We then decided to go and find the La Roca Foradada, an arc of rock formed out of the red rock of the area which was on the flip side of sheet. We could have walked back to town and followed the directions on the sheet, but realised that if we walked up the valley a bit we could do a loop and drop down on to it. So we walked through the trees and woods like we had been doing all morning, following a gravelly path which suddenly dropped down into the bottom of the valley and then voila, there was La Roca Foradada. It was quite impressive – apparently you can climb up and stand in the middle, but we weren’t inclined. The Pup smelt water, but the little tarn nearby was a weird green colour and fenced off, so Pup was denied a paddle.
We strolled back into town and decided to have a coffee/beer. The town was again busy with people wandering around which was great. Our little cafe of yesterday was full, so we sat in the cafe next door. It was a bit off putting as the tables hadn’t been cleared, but we sat down at a table, pushing the debris to one side. We waited for someone to come out and take our order and possibly clear the table, but nobody did (the one person on duty only seemed to drop off drinks) so eventually I went inside and got them myself. The two staff seemed a bit nonplussed about serving and taking my money – it was all a bit odd. So we sat in the warm sunshine and drank our drinks, watched other customers come in and move dirty cups to other tables, not blinking an eyelid and sitting down. Perhaps this was this particular cafes style.
We sauntered back to the campsite via a little shop to pick up a baguette and once back, booked a table at the campsite’s restaurant for tonight. We had a bit of lunch outside though it was very breezy (the mat flew up and knocked Pup’s waterbowl and dust all over us) and there were some pesky flies. So we had a lazy afternoon until it got cooler and the sun set an hour earlier (the downside of the clocks moving back). We had this corner of the campsite to ourselves now as everyone had gone back home after the weekend including the wailing ghoul family. We had booked the restaurant for 8pm as we didn’t want to be the first in when it opened at 7:30 – so we wandered down at 7:50 and found ourselves still the first ones in and wondered why the reception told us we had to book. We told ourselves that maybe everybody would start coming in around 8pm and yes they did – all four of them. To make it worse, we ended up in an area overlooking the reception all on our own, presumably because we had Pup with us. So we ate alone – the meal was very nice and we had wine too, but it wasn’t what we were expecting – the restaurant had been packed yesterday when we arrived, but now everyone was gone. Maybe a blessing – it would have been full of excitable kids and would have been mayhem.
So we waddled back to the Van and settled down. Tomorrow we’re heading to the coast for a change of scenery and hopefully a beach so Pup can have a jolly good run which she hasn’t had for ages. She certainly deserves one!
