Saturday 29 August 2015
Left at about the usual time. .. got to Las Illas about 5pm... I am finding it rather hard to say anything about the walk in between, now we are deep into the Languedoc. It still goes up and down - the high point was almost 1500m, comfortably higher than Ben Nevis - and it was hot and humid again today, which makes climbs difficult, but it is still a far cry from the giddy heights of the central Pyrenees.
There were a couple of interesting things though. We are still near the border ridge here, and the HRP diverges from the GR10 during the day for a brief foray into Spain, though by the time we get to Las Illas we are back in France. The HRP path goes past a Spanish hermitage, the Ermita de la Salinas, which on investigation I found had a cantina, which was happy to sell me a beer for €1. I don't think it is still a working hermitage, as it were, the young couple in charge and their delightful daughter Giarmina didn't look terribly religious, but it was a really nice place, peacefully located deep in a beech forest. Opportunities for beer on the HRP are very limited, and should not be passed up.
Las Illas has no shops or other facilities. It has a small gite d'etape, just a dormitory and a small kitchen, and it has a delightfully old - fashioned hotel, the Hostal dels Trabucayres, which is where I am. The other two, Reg and our new French friend Florent, are in the gite d'etape, but are coming here for dinner
Two more days to go!
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