We hadn’t done a long walk for a while so we headed off to
do Les Balcons de Céret loop track. It is a 3 hour circuit that heads out
through on of the newer suburbs of Céret, then up through some nice scrubby
forest. The French walking tracks are both well and poorly marked. There are
signs at most intersections, and paint lines all the way along the tracks,
however at junctions it is often very unclear which way to go. For instance at
a “Y” junction, the pole with the signs on it may be on the right or the left,
but not necessarily on the leg you should take. And it will have an arrow
pointing directly up, or no arow at all. Once in a while you come to a critical intersection of
roads or tracks, and there will be no sign. Whoever does the signs has
no common sense – they are fine if you already know the way to go, but rubbish
if you don’t.
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| View out onto the Roussillon Plains |
Nevertheless the walk was superb. There was a nice little
waterfall on a short sidetrack, then a nice climb through interesting land
forest and scrub up the hills. It went past several lovely old mas (farms) and finally popped out the
top onto recently mown paddocks. Lovely views, then back down through different
forst to Céret. Three hours all up including lunch. I had turned on Google
tracks on my phone – what an incredible app. It tracks time, speed, distance,
elevation and the path. Very cool.
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| A lovely butterfly - there are plenty |
We didn’t get back until mid-afternoon, just in time to have a really heavy shower of rain, our first decent rain in a month. The timing couldn't have been better as we don't think of needing wet weather gear. In the last of the afternoon, Karen was able to repot our window plants. After a roaring start they had faded away
badly, which we put down to poor potting mix. We had fertilised them a couple
of times in the last fortnight, and the recovery has been remarkable. We’d also
put in some more geranium and other seeds months ago and these little seedlings
which had been stagnating for a month, were now sprouting madly. So they are
now nicely distributed between the pots, and the petunias are blooming well
again.
Another milestone tonight. We had been invited for apero by
the woman opposite us across the square. We were there from 6pm for 1½ hours
discussing all sorts of things, entirely in French. She is the owner of the entire
building opposite – 4 stories with at least 6 rooms per storey. She lives on
level 2, her daughter is on level 1, and levels 3 & 4 are just full of furniture
which she doesn’t need and her 3 children don’t want. The building is centuries
old. There is even a door under the basement that opens into a tunnel that
leads from below the Porte de France right across the heart of Céret, under the
Cathedral and out the other side. The level we were on was gorgeous – ancient
doors, lovely old French furniture that has been passed down for ever. Hidden
at the back of the house is a lovely garden, and this is plumb in the middle of
Céret. Her family still lives up the valley on a farm where they have been
since 1040. Incroyable!
We learnt a lot about the war here – she went back up the
valley to her farm. At one point the Germans knocked on the door and told her father
that they would hold him personally responsible for any people-smuggling – and this
is in an area where 20,000 Jews were smuggled through to Spain. It must have
been appalling. A fascinating evening, and very good for our French.
Today's walk...
https://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msa=0&msid=204617277247232859421.0004c5f748753c0567937
Created by My Tracks on Android.
Name: Les Balcons de Céret
Activity type: Walk
Description: A loop walk from Céret up into the hills above
Total distance: 10.16 km (6.3 mi)
Total time: 3:18:34
Moving time: 1:53:37
Average speed: 3.07 km/h (1.9 mi/h)
Average moving speed: 5.37 km/h (3.3 mi/h)
Average pace: 19.54 min/km (31.5 min/mi)
Average moving pace: 11.18 min/km (18.0 min/mi)
Max elevation: 484 m (1587 ft)
Min elevation: 178 m (583 ft)
Elevation gain: 733 m (2406 ft)
Recorded: 29/07/2012 10:28
