Cahors: the butterflies and the black wine
It was 5:50 am, when I leave Varaire. I had to use my flash to take a picture as I walked out of town. The morning was cold. I decided to used a pair of compression socks that Mary Lee gave me for the trip. They did not covered the toes. The morning transported me to a chill Christmas morning in Puerto Rico.
I have learned to walk on the grass patches on the path. It is like shock absorbers for the many rocks on the way. The grass was wet today, therefore, with the cold temperature I felt that Zi would get a toe frostbite! I walked half of the 32kms by 9am. It was a flat path, no ups no downs.
When I reach 18 kms, I had to walked in a small country road, when suddenly, around 10 cars passed me at the speed of Catholics leaving church after communion. Couple kilometers later, they were all setting the tents and weapons in a field to go skunk hunting with their dogs.
There was not water during this stage. I have to buy a big bottle of water yesterday and carried it the whole time, which I drank before 2pm.
Nine kms from Cahors, a ballet of light purple butterflies danced for me. I was getting tired, and hit a bush. They all came out and surround me. It was like a Garcia Marquez’ book. They were light purple, but if you look carefully, they had a orange dot at the end of their wings.
I saw four deers today early in the morning. Deers in France are small, dark brown color, and very fast. No good for Picts.
At one point of the walk, a group of girls riding horses passed me. They were singing songs, and stopped at my encounter. I encourage them to keep singing. After laughing, they sang!
Close to Cahors became very arid and dried. The temperature rose, and it was very unpleasant to walk. I knew I was only 3 km from Cahors, when I saw the city in a big valley. Ouch!, I said. I am having problems descending on left ankle and right knee. I had to be creative. It was a deep slope. I even walked backwards to make the descending lest painful.
As I entered town, I was very unsecured where to stay, therefore I sat down by the Lot river, for the four time! After 30 minutes, I started walking toward the “gite.” The place was closed. Therefore, I sat under a big fig tree on a bench. Hortense showed up and pulled the cable from the tinny bell, and immediately a man came down and opened the door for us. Hortense’s husband, Arnoud, came after. They are an amazing couple that live in Africa. Arnoud is in the French Army. We introduced each other. And when I told them that I was a priest, Arnoud laughed and told me that he has two brothers priests. They invited me to go with them to The Cathedral at 6:30pm. We arrived early and walked downtown Cahors before mass. The cathedral is very old, and need a lot of repairs. Two priests from Senegal were at mass. I got my Camino Stamp for the day at the Cathedral. I concelebrated there and we returned to the gite.
Dinner was delicious! We have some zucchini-rice casserole with pork duck sausages, and of course black wine. Well know in the region. It is normal to pay after dinner. When my turned came to pay, the house master informed that I was free. I was embarrassed. Therefore, I thanked all the guests.