A rebel without a clue.

Trying to get Lola to wait an extra hour, after we came downstairs at 6, for breakfast... She's crawling the walls and me. Now at 06:55 she's just licked her bowl clean! I am getting her nearer to 7. She can tell you exactly when she is to be fed: she's showing some unusual body language: sitting up and almost pondering my change of behaviour. Now she's back by my side on the sofa, after I'd listened to the In Our Time podcast - which I feel has just gone a little stale, or scraping the bottom of a barrel for subject matter - with still a quizzical expression on her face: such a beautiful face. It's kind of triangular and very symmetrical. It's one which has become fixed in my mind in a manner akin to mother and child (but I don't know who is the child between us). She's just sighed, as the food hits her empty belly, and returned to Snoozeland for an hour until we go on another traipse.  This weekend is meant to be a heatwave - 22°C - so I am going t...

A day of tired exercise. I walked down to the Armouries, and Leeds Dock, before I was advised to leave Leeds city centre as masses were degorged upon Boar Lane, from the Railway Station, in pulses and cycles as various engines came alongside the platforms. A often broken 4 hours up to the Hollies and Meanwood Park before following the Beck back towards town. Ten miles. Yesterday was a blow out. First one in a while. Tonight I am calming the bodily formations. Read up to chapter 18 of Dandelion Days  as Leeds disturbs me with its automobile noise and the gentle song of a blackbird closer to, and more vivid, than the barren drone of the arterial roads connecting nothing with nothing. A good night's sleep and early to Wetherby for Merry Legs, allotment, lawn mowing and other green fingered passions...

It's been a bit chaotic since I arrived back in Wetherby late on Sunday afternoon. Last night was the first when I literally stopped at all and attempted to calm the bodily formations: meditation. As soon as mother switched on the TV, and the BBC news began banging on about the Ukraine, I retreated and was on the bed calming down my inner formations - deep intentional breathing. Not once, since I left for France, had I had a midday siesta. Often I looked at the side of the path a thought it's too cold and damp to stop for a moment. Rarely did I hang around in any space and drove myself on towards the end goal. Meditation has become a more sparodic practice this year. Like ACIM, I am trying to have a little time away from what had become almost all encompassing. 

Just over two hours walk the rural way to the airport, apart from the last house on the right, who wouldn't open a gate for me - le Grande Bois (I gave him a raspberry, turned back and walked through his paddock) - it was a healthy option. Still no public transport. Just the Flyer at Leeds Bradford Airport, and sullen faced folks in the queue to check in baggage. The long yawn back to Blighty begins. Time to arrange my backpack and hand luggage and then eat a breakfast a leak quiche and Belchard apple: Charentes - purchased at Les Halles. As departures gets busy I sit on the floor: no way to socially distance... It's a tiny airport. The dreadful monologue of the Geordie couple behind me... They say nothing, but could take forever. Waiting. I hate flying. It's so meaningless.

I've realized I am a lucky man. Serendipity is the means by which life unfolds. To be true take the suggestions presented. I tried very hard to find a place to stay for under €40 in Limoges, but there is some event on here until Sunday: so the place is complet  and I was wondering if I could sleep at the airport this evening? I've done it before: but I slept on the floor better then... now I hardly sleep without some cushioning. Having left the Tourisme with no where: no place for pilgrim or place for tourist, I was stranded in Limoges. Second bite of the city since 2018 and it was playing against me again. Last time the Sœurs Franciscan was full and this time closed because they have no electricity: that's mendicant pour vous! Up to Les Halles, just as it was closing at 3pm, and I saw Greenville...  and the rest would appear to be history. I've got to walk to Rue de Strasbourg, 39, and the proprietor (Richard/Ricard) of Greenville is willing, even with his GF arriving ...

Rarely have I been so exhausted from anything. Yesterday, and the previous 9 days, walking like a fool, 30 kilometres a day, I couldn't keep from yawning. After I had had some food: a savoury humus tartine with roasted veg, etc., and a Petrus Red, my legs carried me through the Basilique, into the guesthouse and back up the 3 floors. Where I washed some smalls, and crawled into bed. Woken by several voices in the night, people leaving their various occasions, I rolled over and woke with a start at 6:30... ... Such a relief to be knowing I did what I did regardless without much more than a finger infection; which appears to have vanished - abracadabra. Penicillin and healthy being? My mind isn't so tangled today as it might've been. Oh but I lost a book - I left it as I paid for the meal... Cakes and Ale, Penguin Orange, 1950, Somerset Maugham. Blue sky this morning. Yup. It's over and the weather changed!!! If I had zero responsibilities in Yorkshire, and a limitless am...

As I walk along La Loire for the final few kilometres it seems the weather is changing: it's still raining, and windy, but the sun is putting in an appearance between clouds. Just as I reach the end of this 'pilgrimage': a pause for another time as tomorrow I am hopping into another BlaBla car to Limoges, then au revoir France and hello Yorkshire (with all its personal hazards). Ten days in some pretty awful weather, and carrying too much stuff, but I must've covered around 300 kilometres between Paris and Tours? Today is another 30 clicks day. At noon I had an Artisanale hamburger in Montlouis-sur-Loire which was enough and got me out of the torrential downpour I had had since 8 leaving Amboise... On my right a mini golf course, after coming down from the top of the escapement where Vouvray AOC grows, it's another couple of bridges before Pont Wilson: which I crossed before on foot - although I am not sure I walked the section I am on in 2014? Last time...