La Souterraine

Not the best night's sleep and i think I kept Keith up too with my snoring? He could hear it the previous night through the partition walls, so in the same room it must've been difficult?

Packed up and made a chocolate drink from a few cubes of a good quality dark chocolate, except it had whole almonds in it so I used a spoon mainly: in the pantry there was an unopened packet French crisp bread which was an ideal sop for the chocolate drink.

Now I am ready again: day twelve of walking.It's getting a little darker in the mornings: noticeably! It's all good: coffee 5 kilometres up the road and I have more chocolate, bread and a block of emmental to send me onwards and I ate a lot of pasta yesterday around 3pm, which I hope is still about? 25 kilometres today into Limousin?

Last night I finished A Moveable Feast and I left Hemingway on the coffee table for another person to read. Again, for the second times this time out, I am without reading material. But it's interesting following the route up the Sedelle as it falls over boulders on its way to join the Creuse in the Lac de Chambon. Perhaps another livre will present itself in the next Gîte: last night's was pretty bare!

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I feel walking in France is as close to walking before ww2 or ww1 as is possible in the 21st century. It's the distinctive rurality/pastoralism. Old barns, collapsing. Grand ancient farm houses, unique grand château and elegant monumental middle age churches. And where else can you drink from a spring? It's wonderful. It always says non potable, but that's untrue... It's just not been tested for purity. ever since I was coming from Geneva to Le Put I've ignored the sign, or lack of sign, and just tasted the water, then drunk my fill and filled up the 1 litre flask...

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I am not a royalist, or very keen on the privileged who run the UK primarily for themselves, but as I walk down yet another drovers path, listening to the bluetits talk in the hedgerow, I am kind of saddened by her passing... I guess all her hard work down the seventy years is something not to overlook on a day of final remembrance?

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And I am here. A long day of no real stopping, no cafés to speak of, but I made the centre of La Souterraine in time for Bœuf... Entrecôte Limousine. And then find a bed... And is this it? Marsac has a station in it so possibly I walk there tomorrow?

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Really wanted a shower and a siesta, but had to return passed the Porte Saint Jean and the eglise to get cash out of the La Poste ATM I passed earlier: obviously the Gîte is cash only. But it OK. This feels like it for me? The Entrecôte did me and my energy tanks are very low! However tonight is a pilgrim supper which tends to click the right buttons. I've located a walking stick which may be one of the pilgrims I am seeing throughout the last couple of days so I decided to bring it to the Gîte and if it's no one's... My right knee is playing silly buggers this day! Could I ever use one of these things? Nordic walking nonsense... It's Adrienne's! I knew it was one of the pilgrims'.