France is no Switzerland when it comes to traveling with your bicycle on its trains, but infinitely better than Japan (my other frame of reference for train-friendly countries), and probably better than most EU countries. Here is how you can take your bike around the country.

Wheel it on (for free!)

Corail Intercités, middle-distance trains. On most of these trains (you need to check the timetable to make sure) you can take bikes onto the carriage reserved for them. The symbol looks something similar to this.

On nearly every TER (local trains for short/middle distances) you can push your bike right on. The new ones have excellent facilities, as you can see from this picture. Careful though, not all TERs are created equal. At the moment in Languedoc it’s a real crap shoot as to what century your next train will have been made in!

Wheel it on (and pay!)

Most TGV (high-speed), Corail Lunéa (overnight), and Corail Téoz (long distant trains) have space for bikes, but it is necessary to pay for this luxury when you book your ticket (10 euros). In addition, this reservation cannot be made online, so you have to do it at the station, at a SNCF boutique, or call them. A bit of a hassle in the internet age, so maybe they’ll fix this little problem soon. Here are our old bikes on the Corail Téoz from Toulouse to Paris.

Dismantled and Bagged

Any train will accept a bicycle like this, if there is enough space. But in reality there is always enough space. Even on the most crowded TGVs you can find room to cram your bagged bike in. Not ideal, but it’ll get you where you want to go. No reservation necessary.

I really hate dismantling my bike and avoid it at all costs, mainly because you need to shove these huge bags (see below) into tight spaces, alongside hard suitcases and the like. In my experience also, the space allotted for baggage on most trains here is woefully inadequate, so you might end up having to store your bike far from your seat. But, especially with the TGV, it is certainly a fast way to get yourself across the country.

Some links:

• Reservation site for the SNCF (National Railway of France). Tickets can be picked up at any station in France, either at the counter, or better yet, at the ticket machines themselves (but only if you have a credit/debit card with a microchip on it). They cannot be mailed to your home country.

http://www.voyages-sncf.com/

• If you need your ticket before you leave home, you have to book through these guys. I’ve never tried them, but the SNCF uses them to sell to overseas customers.

www.raileurope.com

• More information in English on making reservations here.

• The SNCF page for bicycles (the info above – and much more – in French).

http://www.velo.sncf.com/

Welcome to our 2009!

We Found (then lost) Our MOJO

These series of events happened near the middle of the year, but I have to get them out of the way first, so this wrap-up ends on a positive note! Here’s what went down. I, in a mental fit probably brought on by my ongoing mid-life crisis (see motorcycle below), decided we needed a dog sometime in April. Shoko had her doubts (mostly about my sanity) but went along with the idea, and we proceeded to search out the local SPA. What we ended up choosing was this.

Why? Oh, the irony! This dog was virtually the only one not barking at us. Little did we know that this was probably just a sign of his psychotic nature. We probably should have guessed something was up when we tried to take him home on the bike trailer (bad decision probably for any dog). Mojo repeatedly made suicide leaps to escape, forcing me to bungy him into the thing. By the time we got him home, hours later, we were all worn out from the stress, but hopeful that what the lying or totally ignorant SPA volunteer told us as we were leaving -’he is just excited to be outside’ – was true. I wish it had been that simple.

He was a shaggy mess when we liberated him, but once we got him plucked and cleaned up he was pretty cute, if a little weird in his sleeping style.

But Mojo had a dark side. In the apartment he was manageable, but once we got him outside he went nuts, pulling, marking, leaping at shadows. He wasn’t making us any friends, that’s for sure. We tried everything in the book to get him to act like a civilized dog, but it was fruitless. Thinking it might be something hormonal, we had him fixed. He didn’t like that much.

But who would? Still, it was the right thing to do, if for no other reason, Mojo couldn’t procreate!

In the end, after 2 months of stress on all sides, I brought him to a pro. The guy was all ‘oh, he just needs to take a pee, that’s why he’s acting up’ at the beginning. By the end of our 2 hours, Mr. Casteneda was sweating and chain smoking, saying over and over again, ‘il est dur, il est dur…’ He said that Mojo had probably been taken away from his mother too young and had never been properly socialized (one large problem was that he attacked every dog he saw), and that he could work on him but could promise much.

I was sold. The next day I packed him up on the trailer and took him back to the SPA. Nearly no look of surprise on their faces, to MY surprise. Then I found out (we had suspected this) that he had been adopted once already before us, and presumably the previous owners couldn’t handle him either. It was a tiny bit sad leaving him there, but he didn’t appear to mind at all, so that helped. And to fill up the whole in my life I bought a motorcycle!

Tour de France

If you know me even a little, you know I like most things ‘bicycle’. And if you know  anything about cycling, you know that the biggest thing ‘bicycle’ occurs where I live – The Tour de France. 2009 was a special year because Lance Armstrong (7 time winner, cancer survivor, and guy sort of around my age) made a comeback after 4 years off the bike. It was also special because the Tour started in the south (Monaco) and even had a stage (team time trial) in Montpellier, where we live. I won’t repeat what I’ve already done, so here are the links to the blog articles I wrote on the 4 stages we saw live this year.

Monaco (Stage One)

Le Rouret (Stage Two)

Montpellier (Stage Four)

Un bar and Col d’Agnes (Stages Seven and Eight)

And a few pictures that never made it to print…

Get Your Motor Runnin’…

After Mojo went back to the SPA to torture somebody else, I felt strangely liberated (was this how mom felt when I finally left home…?), and while Shoko was safely thousands of kilometers away in Japan, I bought a motorcycle. This is it – a Honda TransAlp 650.

This is one  spontaneous purchase that has paid dividends, since we immediately extended our ‘range’ by hundreds of kilometers. The train system is pretty good in France, but it certainly doesn’t reach everywhere. Wheels are essential if you really want to explore your neighborhood. Following are some shots from a few trips we did this year.

The pilgrim’s cathedral in Le Puy en Velay.

Near the perfectly-preserved village of Conques.

Detail of the tympanum on the abbey church of Conques.

The abbey and village from across the valley.

A bonus that came with the motorcycle was being able to get to the mountains and start hiking again. This is near the equally lovely village of St. Guilhem le Desert about an hour from Montpellier.

And a little further afield in the Pyrenees.

The picture above gave me the inspiration for this next section: living in France, the pros and cons. Why? Because included in the backpacks of our French friends above were numerous bottles of wine, cheese and sausages! So hiking style goes on  the ‘pro’ list.

Pro – I can join a demonstration and be nearly sure I won’t be tear gassed (see 2005 Wrap-up).

Pro- you’re never far from something really, really old and interesting.

Pro – I am allowed to kiss other women.

Cons – No place is perfect, and there are some irritating aspects about France. I just don’t have any pictures of them!

1. Those demonstrations? They are often carried out by the people who operate our trains…another good reason to have wheels!

2. Dog shit.

3. Dog shit on the bottom of my shoe.

Central Europe

Something strange has happened since we moved here last year. I’m usually planning my next trip while on the one I’m on, but since we are in a place where I would have come to travel from wherever I might be living, I find myself more or less content to stay close to home. But, having said that, there are places outside France to visit (Yes French friends, there really are…) and for our Big Trip last summer we went through 4 of them – Germany, Switzerland, Austria and Liechtenstein. Since this was a cycling trip, like the Tour de France above, it’s all in the blog already. If you care to click a few times, here are the pages.

http://gerrypatt.wordpress.com/2009/09/14/central-europe-loop-first-day/

http://gerrypatt.wordpress.com/2009/09/16/central-europe-loop-day-2/

http://gerrypatt.wordpress.com/2009/09/17/central-europe-loop-days-3-and-4/

http://gerrypatt.wordpress.com/2009/09/18/central-europe-loop-day-5/

http://gerrypatt.wordpress.com/2009/09/19/central-europe-loop-day-6/

http://gerrypatt.wordpress.com/2009/09/20/the-ridiculous-hills-of-switzerland-aka-central-europe-loop-day-7/

http://gerrypatt.wordpress.com/2009/09/21/central-europe-loop-day-8/

http://gerrypatt.wordpress.com/2009/09/22/central-europe-loop-day-9-10/

http://gerrypatt.wordpress.com/2009/09/25/central-europe-loop-days-12-13-14/

Oh my, that is a lot of clicking! For those of you too busy with your own lives to read about ours, here is a super-abbreviated version.

Yes I agree. This shot sort of came out of nowhere. You see, the reason we chose Germany to start our trip in was that our good friends Thilo and Maya were getting hitched there. It was a magical wedding at a castle in the Bavarian countryside. The day was filled with drinking, dancing and something no wedding should be without…whip sawing.

From Germany we drove back to France and broke out the bikes in Strasbourg. This is the Rhone-Rhine canal just outside the city.

Then it was back into Germany…

…Switzerland…

…Austria (long enough to eat an apple and go back into Switzerland)

Liechtenstein (long enough to ride through the entire country – an hour or two)…

Back into Switzerland one more time…

And then into France and back home. Here’s a map of the whole ride.

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But really, you should check out the blog. It’s much more entertaining

Visitors

9 years in Japan and 2 more in Singapore and a total of 3 family members visited us. 1 year in France and we’re ahead already! I’m not complaining…just saying.

First up were Lois and Gary, on their first Grand Tour of Europe together. After a week on a cruise and another soaking up the sun in Italy, they hopped on several trains and somehow made it to Montpellier. Here they are either looking extremely happy or totally petrified, just off the train in Montpellier.

On a little road trip, picnicking near St Guilhem le Desert.

Hamming it up a little ways up the road.

Then, near the end of the day, on the Roman Via Domitia. Notice Gary at the right. Is he:

a) Trying to impress us by patting his head and rubbing his stomach simultaneously?

b) Getting a headache contemplating how the Romans built this thing?

c) Saying “can we go home now?” to his wife in sign language?

I don’t know the answer, but it was getting late in the day…

As soon as we got Lois and Gary safely on their TGV to Paris, we were off to Barcelona for our next ‘visit’. Mom and Tom were on a mighty 20-day cruise and the closest port of call was 330 km away in Spain. Shoko and I hopped (okay…crawled) on the motorcycle at 5am for the 5 hour ride to the capital of Catalonia. We arrived without a minute to spare, riding right up onto the base of the Columbus Monument, which Mom was circling slowing, keeping watch.

After parking the bike we went to the ship, where they’d arranged for us to be allowed on for a visit.

I have never ever contemplated taking a cruise, but after seeing the buffet they got every single day I may reconsider! Here is Mom and Tom walking up La Ramblas.

And as soon as it started it was all over. They set sail that night for Africa and the end of their cruise. For the relatives and friends who haven’t visited yet, don’t waste time. We have no idea how long the French will tolerate our presence here.

Getting Educated

Shoko finished up with her French course at the university here this June and promptly applied to the School of Fine Arts (up the road in Nimes) for night classes. She was accepted, and spends two days a week painting naked students…and others, apparently desperate to make a euro or two. She hopes to start there full time (or somewhere else) next year or the year after. All depends on the dreaded French language, and her mastery over it.

Me, well I joined a gym, but I guess I’m not learning much there. I continue to take French lessons from Magali, now officially the most patient language teacher in France! It’s coming along…better than Japanese ever did at least.

L’avenir

We are sort of taking this France experiment one year at a time, mainly because that’s all the French are giving us in terms of residence permits. We both see more possibilities here than in either Japan or Singapore, and I just can’t stomach the idea of choosing either snow or rain when it comes to Canada. So, for the time being we will see what we can make of Europe.

We are looking forward to watching the Vancouver Olympics in French, like we did the summer ones in China. At least the Winter Olympics don’t have handball – one of the only sports the French excel at, and therefore televise it much more than is really necessary. I just hope they aren’t good in curling!

Le Tour will come again next summer, so for 3 weeks in July I will be either glued to my computer or chasing down the peleton on our Honda.

Our Big Trip next year is being constructed as I write this, so too soon to give it away. It is looking to be going east though.

We have no plans on adopting any animals in 2010.

Hope you all had a wonderful 2009, and we wish you the very best in the coming year.

Gerry and Shoko

I saw the darndest thing today on my ride up north. Riding through the tiny, uninhabited hills north of the source du Lez, I passed this fellow traveller.

A dog on the road. Nothing strange, you say. Well, not really, except this was kilometers from the nearest house, AND she had a baguette in her mouth. Even in France it’s just something you don’t see every day.

She was pretty irritated by my relentless stalking, and shortly after I took the photo above, took off into the garrigue and a quieter route home I guess. I then passed by Les Matelles and headed south. This is the village sprawl with Pic St Loup in the background.

From Les Matelles I swung by St Gely du Fesc, caught the cycling path, and looped back to near Prades le Lez, where I took this photo of Chateau de Restinclières, an isolated place that is well worth a visit. It usually has environmentally-themed exhibitions, and the vast grounds are crisscrossed by walking trails with picnic spots. On the map below I’ve marked the beginning of the trail that takes you to the chateau, if you are ever in the neighborhood. There’s parking here, too.

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I had big aspirations today. I looked at the map and noticed a village that was tucked into the hills some 20 km west of Montpellier, and I had never been there. As it turned out, there is probably a good reason why – namely because there is nothing to this village except an unremarkable church and a mini-suburban sprawl that surprised me somewhat (suburbs of what?).

But all was not lost. The day, although cold, was clear, and the roads sans traffic as usual. This is the remnants of an ancient chateau that I passed on my way to Valhauquès.

When I got to my destination and discovered what wasn’t there, I high tailed it out of there pretty quick, so no pictures. But then, as I was exiting the village, the road narrowed, crossed a little stream (dry of course…), and started up into the hills.

As you can see from the tire marks on this road, it is just wide enough for one car, but where they come from I have no idea. I didn’t see any. I cannot tell you how much joy these little surprises give me, and luckily in France there are plenty of them to keep me happy. Here’s a shot from around the corner.

And that was it really. As soon as I turned around I caught the westerly wind that was blowing today and had no more chances to stop for pictures – 35 kph is too fun and too rare!

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Firstly, thanks to Peter from the Languedoc Page for reminding me that I had to get off my butt and check this thing out. I’d been sort of meaning to ride this 20-km long cycling path for over a year, but since it starts over 35km from home I guess I just never had the juice to go out and do it. But thanks to 19 degree weather and a busted PC that kept me inside all weekend (yes, it’s a Windows…need you ask?), I had lots of aggression to get out of my system. So, after lunch today I packed up a pannier and took off.

The ride to Sommieres took in mostly well-rolled terrain, which you can find here and here, but starting from there until Nimes it was all fresh. This shot was taken from the still-functioning Roman bridge you can see the first link above.

Here is the beginning of the voie verte, or greenway, that the department of Gard has built, right next to the hotel we stayed at a year ago, incidentally. Well, it’s not that incidental, actually. You see, this cycling path is built where a railway used to be (that hotel is a converted train station) – an eminently excellent idea that has been implemented in many countries.

The path was surprisingly well populated, especially near Sommieres. This pictures handily shows the multi-purpose nature of these things, with bladers, runners and the (unseen in this photo but there) ever-unpredictable kids on bikes (what prevents kids from travelling in a straight line anyhow?).

A nice economic bonus to building cycling paths over train lines is that you don’t need to worry about drilling through rock or making bridges and tunnels…it’s already been done for you!

Next, a couple of random pictures of the Nimeois countryside.

Another nice thing about this voie verte (and other former railway lines I suppose) is that it winds through some villages along its way. Here are some locals in Cavisson playing petanque, a game somewhere between shuffleboard and curling, and about as exciting to watch.

Here’s the map, as usual. The cycling path is between Sommieres and Caveirac. I’ll include it in my cycling paths entry as well.

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Excuse the redundancy, but having found the secret to fixing my scanner I find myself needing to ‘re-package’ a few of these old ‘flashbacks’.

I lived near a river called Tamagawa for most of my 9 years in Japan. Without too much of an exaggeration, this long strip of cycling bliss probably saved my sanity on more than a few occasions. Living in Tokyo can be tough for a hick like me.

The cycling path along Tamagawa starts right at Tokyo Bay, near Haneda Airport, and runs up over 50 km to around the city of Ome. From Ome you’ve got relatively quiet roads to bring you into the low mountains at the western edge of Greater Tokyo.

In these mountains, perched 900 meters up on top of one of them, is the isolated village of Mitake, filled to the gills with quaint inns, a very famous shrine, and one youth hostel, which I used a couple of times, hoping they wouldn’t ask me for ID!

Here is the first time I went up, evidenced by The Emperor, in all his shit-brown glory.

The sign says 44 km from the sea, by the way, so this is pretty far up the path. The next one is a random photo a little farther up, only of interest because it shows how the path gets more ‘natural’ and rural. Admittedly this isn’t very illuminating if you don’t know how utterly urban the scene is 20 km down river.

Here is where I had lunch. This is a bento shop, a little place that sells already-made meals to go. Bentos, although probably not very environmentally friendly, are one of the things I miss most about Japan, especially now that, being in France, all I can get quickly are sandwiches and kebabs.

Well, that was my first trip up there, probably in around 2003. Following is the next one, with Nigel. I think this was in the spring of 2005.

Here we are on our way to Mitake-san. Me tempting fate to get a shot of Nigel…giving me the finger? And next, one of the hundreds of plum trees that were in full bloom that weekend.

In the village of Mitake -san now. An amazingly thick thatched roof.

Above: Mitake-san. Accessible by cable car or stupidly steep road. Two tickets, please!

This is Nigel the next morning, choosing his Cannondale for the ride home.

Next, a restaurant I think you’d have to be pretty damn hungry to stop at.

Following are a few pictures near the end of our ride, at a beer/sake maker on the edge of Tokyo.

I guess that last picture is a good way to finish off. Anyway, I don’t remember anything after that last round..!

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The scanner is back from the dead, so here is another older post beefed up with new pictures.

Cycling buddy Nigel and I did a couple of rides from Tokyo over the years (if you just can’t get enough of him, fret not! He is prominently featured in Flashback #5), starting with a 400 km loop up to Nikko.

Tip#1 – if you want to ride for any distance in and around Tokyo without traffic, find a river. If you are lucky it’ll have a cycling path. We were, and this one did (Tonegawa), which was nice but it kept stopping, then starting up somewhere further down or even on the other side of the river. Anyhow, it got us up to the relative quiet of the hills on the edge of the Kanto plain. Here is Nigel at lunchtime, proving he can use chopsticks.

And our bikes at the noodle stall.

This is Toshogu shrine , part of the UNESCO-protected temples and shrines of Nikko, and the one with the ‘hear no evil, see no evil, say no evil’ monkey carving, if you’re into shrine trivia.

And a bunch of sake barrels at the same temple. I’m sure they’re used for religious purposes…

The following day we threw ourselves at irohazaka, a winding climb of 38 hairpin turns (I didn’t count…it just seems to be a well-known fact) that is steep and full of cars, but makes it all worthwhile by selling soft ice cream at the mid-way point. Here we are sweating – proof of the struggle this hill demands.

Thinking we had the worst behind us, Nigel and I relaxed at Lake Chuzenjiko, even taking time out to photograph some of those ridiculous Japanese swan boats you can find on just about any lake in the country.

But it wasn’t over. We still had another few hundred vertical meters to go up, but luckily after the lake the traffic thinned out and it was a really pleasant ride to the pass. The rest was a fast downhill to Numata City, and some re-hydration.

The following day, our last, was insane. This was a 3-day weekend and we had to get back home for work the next day. But there was a slight problem; we were very, very far away. I can’t speak for Nigel, but I was afraid to know how far exactly, so we just got up real early and blasted off towards Tokyo.

This is one of the only shots I have from that 200 km day. I look quite fresh, I think, at least when compared to the crumpled heap of jelly I was at home some 12 hours later.

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This entry is actually from a while back, but I’ve slapped a couple of photos in and added some more content.

I lived in Japan for nearly 10 years, and rode a lot. Unfortunately, I only did a few ‘real’ trips, the rest being up and down (and up and down, and up and…) the Tama river near our place in Kawasaki. Japan, at least where I lived, was less than ideal for cycling. Chiba, Tokyo, Kawasaki, and Yokohama (really just one immense city) have a population of over 30,000,000, or around the total in Canada. That should explain it. But once you do get out of the urban sprawl (get up early!) the countryside is pretty nice, and the roads are excellent, if mostly shoulderless.

In the fall of 1999 I took a ferry from Tokyo to the northern prefecture of Hokkaido, for a 700 km circuit of the east side of the island. Unlike Kanto (where Tokyo is), Hokkaido is very cyclist friendly. Lots of space, lots of nature and not lots of cars (at least in September..). It’s like a mini Canada only with better food. And for those who think Japan = $$$, check this out. I stayed at these things called Rider Houses; very basic accommodation (really just a space on a tatami floor) mainly used by motorcyclists. The most I paid was 800 yen, and the cheapest was 500; or max $10. This is what you get at a Rider House. Pretty spartan, but always clean and always cheap.

The food was amazing, as is typical all over Japan, the scenery really is spectacular (Shiretoko is a World Heritage area), and most nights I had a hot spring bath (each municipality seemed to have one) waiting for my aching legs at the end of each day’s ride.

But it’s not all fun and games. The islands lying off the coast where I was riding were taken by Russia after WWII and Japan wants them back.

Er…Japan, maybe if you yelled at them in their own language you’d get someplace?

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In 2000 I made it back to Nepal (click here for my first trip) and much had changed. In ‘95 Durbar Square, the ancient heart of Kathmandu,  seemed to be a forgotten (or yet to be discovered?) area of the city, and in the mornings and evenings was virtually deserted, at least by travelers. Freak Street was still pretty freaky, and you could find places to stay for $2 a night. 5 years later my $2/night hotel had morphed into something prohibitively expensive, and even the apple pie was getting pricey!

Oh, and the cows had moved on to greener pastures, it seemed. When I first went the whole old city (particularly at night) was taken over by roaming bands of holy cows and wild dogs. Traffic, awful enough without livestock, was often gridlocked. Cows, being sacred, were rarely kicked or shoved, so they presented a real obstacle course along the narrow streets of medieval Kathmandu. But in 2000 they were mostly gone, due, I think, to a government policy to make the place a little easier to get around, and more hygienic to boot.

But we went to Nepal to trek, and ended up doing two, after I recovered from an evil bout of bacterial diarrhea (speaking of hygiene!). I’ll spare you the gory details, but if you’re ever in Kathmandu with health problems (chances are reasonably high) the place to go is the CIWEC Clinic, curing incontinence since 1982!

The first trek we did is called the Helambu Trek, the only major one in Nepal that actually starts in the Kathmandu valley. It’s just a taxi ride out of town, then you hit the trail where the flatness ends. Too simple.

Well, not really. This ‘moderate’ (proof once again that Lonely Planet writers may not go everywhere they write about) trek turned out to be just about the toughest one I’d done. Since you are going north, cutting across east-west mountain ranges, and without the aid of giant valleys like the Kali Kandaki of Annapurna fame, it is an endless trek up and down and up and down…steeply. I would recommend this one though, if you only have time to do a one-week trek, since you start close to the city and easy to get back as well. You also have the choice to hook up with another trek right in the Himalaya, called Langtang, which together would be nearly 3 weeks, I think.

I don’t remember what happened, but there are no pictures from this trek. Probably we had no time to stop to enjoy the view, or in the last few days, our fingers where too frozen to press down the shutter button.

But somehow we’ve got pics of our next trek – Jomsom. Jomsom is actually the 2nd half of the Annapurna trek, done backwards, and therefore pretty well known to me. But Shoko had never been to Nepal, and as far as I know, the Jomsom trek is just about the best intro to hiking in Nepal that there is.

The walk takes about a week, and cuts up one of the deepest valleys in the world. If you are there in the right season (Oct-Feb) you have outstanding views of 8000+ meter mountains on both sides of you. And, like any trek in Nepal that starts low and finishes high, it’s really interesting culturally. Hinduism predominates in the lowlands (were rice can be grown it seems) and Buddhists rule the sparsely populated higher elevations.

Following are a few random shots of said higher elevations. This first one is walking up the Kali Kandaki, probably around 2000 meters up.

This one is much higher, as you can see from the total absence of trees. I think this is even past Jomsom town itself. The wind is wicked here, by the way, and whips down the valley like clockwork, starting up in the late morning,and in full rage by the early afternoon.

Here is more wind, this time on top of the gompa (monastery) in Kagbeni, an amazing medieval village on the doorstep of  ‘forbidden’ Mustang. It’s not actually forbidden, but independent trekkers are. You need to take a tour to get in there. This is looking north into this mysterious and expensive land.

And a little higher up the trail from Kagbeni, now near Thorong la, the 5500 meter pass that I crossed the other way in 1995. The scenery up here is other-worldly and, especially after 7 or 8 days walking to get here, you really feel the isolation. But you are never far from civilization really, if you call cold Heinekens civilization!

Back in Kathmandu after the trek we had lots of time to sight see while we waited for India and Pakistan to give us visas. Here is Bodnath, the place where much of Little Buddha was filmed…and incidentally one of the largest stupas in the world and one the holiest sites in Nepal.

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We woke up to sun today, happy that The Weatherman still can’t get it right even in the 21st century. A day of hiding from the elements quickly transformed into this little journey.

I’d been meaning to get up to this area for a long, long time, but until now the dreaded crowds kept me away. Well, luckily the French are much like the rest of the world and do their sightseeing when everybody else is doing it – namely, not on November 1.

This is looking down at Navacelles, the mediaeval village where we started our hike. The geology of the area is interesting, and you can educate yourself here, if you want. This gorge is super isolated, mainly due to the terrible condition of the two roads coming into it. They are both basically just paved donkey trails – lots of fun on a motorcycle, but thankfully impossible for tour buses.

It was a beautiful late fall day today, as evidenced by these pictures, I hope. Last year it was the vine leaves that shocked me with their multitude of vibrant colors. This year it is the garrigue, the predominant type of vegetation around here.

The hike we did today wound its way along the river valley to an ancient, unused mill, which had really informative signs in French, and really humorous ones in English…here I thought the Japanese had a monopoly on screwing up our language. France is proving me wrong.

Here’s the tightly-crammed village of Navacelles as we were leaving.

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