Reclined on comfortable lounges following a delightful meal in the long, long northern evening, we each take time to record the events of the day. Ultimately readers will discern which rendering likely best reflects the truth of our shared experience, but just in case you’re wavering….mine’s what really happened.
Rip snorter of a blue sky day. After securing our camino pass books from Claude at the town office, just before the buses arrived and the office went from ‘us’ at 9:30am to ‘thirty’ queued down the street, we went for jambon de pay ( local ham), essentially bacon, for brunch.
A final reshuffle of our gear and we haul the wheely bags up the 1 in 10 cobbled incline to find the courier ‘donkey’ is closed for lunch. 7am to 9am then 4pm to 8pm. Interesting hours, I’m sure we’ll get used to it.
We walk the city Walls and circle the citadel, buy some snacks for tomorrow, and finally, farewell our bags off to Santiago de Compostella with Donkey. Our backpacks, of course, are still with us and we’ve whittled them down to about 6kg (Di) and 7.5kg (jeff). Although with water and snacks it’s probably more than that. The main problem is the Pyrenees. At over 1000m we need to make sure we’ve got the right gear so some poor bastard doesn’t get dragged out of bed to save our sorry arses if there’s a freak snow storm. But today reached twenty odd degrees and tomorrow’s looking good so the extra layers and rain gear are just weight. Oh well.
Saint John Pied de Port’s ‘old town’ consists of a main street that crosses a lovely stone bridge over the river Nive and rises up to the citadel. Most of the old whitewashed buildings are now accommodation, restaurants or camino supply stores (walking poles, packs etc), and ‘pilgrims’ walk its cobbles to stock up or sight see as they pass through.
Not all but many here are in boots and backpacks. We pass a hostel bar where a bunch of younger pilgrims are well on the way, charging glasses and ‘buen (good) Camino-ing’ with frivolity and fervour. One young lady repeats, ‘tomorrow it’ll be buen camino’, in deep, staged, hangover tones. We agree Kontiki Camino is not our thing and head off for a quiet sangria in comfy chairs in the evening sun before roast chicken at our restaurant next door.
We’re all good to go and head off up the Pyrenees for Border (just up the hill from Orisson) at about 10am.
