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Up and out of bed at 07:18, into the shower block for a lovely shower and now I’m eating my pre-soaked breakfast porridge. It’s excellent and cooked much quicker.1
The weather is excellent today, mild and sunny. It’ll get warmer. It’s currently very damp and dewy.
08:30: Yesterday afternoon, when the rain arrived, two lads on bikes pitched up a tent near me. We all spent the afternoon under canvas but didn’t chat, apart from greetings on the way to or from the shower block. This morning, as they were packing up, I asked them where they were going. “Amsterdam to Avignon” came the reply. That’s 1,400km and they’re doing it over three weeks. They reckoned my setup was pretty spartan, but it isn’t really — a tent with walls and a groundsheet is really more of a psychological shelter than a physical one. We wished each other well. They’re on their way; I still have to break camp.
09:31: Packed away, ready to put the bag on.
11:25: Stopping for a rest. I’m scoffing some peanuts. Route finding along the canal is very straightforward.
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11:39: Moving again.
12:15: Nomexy-sur-Moselle. Gonna see if I can buy some bread here. Épinal 16km. It’s tough enough today but I’m going at an easy pace.
12:34: It’s roasting hot. I bought a baguette and a cake for €2.90. There’s a café across the road, I’m going to rest for a while there.
So what I actually want for lunch is a load of fresh fruit, but only the boulangerie and the bar are open. I’ll probably have soup with the bread, even though the day is baking.
13:09: Lovely chat with Aisling on Telegram. Heading back to the canal now to munch some bread.
13:50: Found a picnic table on the canal. I’m eating a bare-basics lunch of bread with scallion, bread with chili pickle, bread with lime pickle.2 My butter is on the point of going sour, so the oily pickles are doing the job.
14:17: Oops, heavy drops. Thunderclaps. All my stuff out on the table! Gotta pack up!
14:44: That was hilarious — I sheltered by crouching under the table with my gear. Insane torrent. Sun is out now and the picnic table is steaming.
15:26: Épinal 9km. Beautiful weather again.
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16:22: Épinal 6km. No discomfort, but I’m not exactly ripping along.
17:40: Had to climb up a high embankment onto a road into Épinal proper. No big deal. I’m 20 or so minutes from my AirBnB. I’m going well.
17:50: Hilly, prosperous suburbia. Sunny spells and scattered showers.
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18:04: Apartment blocks. Still climbing.
18:14: Heading down the other side of the hill. In an older suburb now, 1970s or 80s.
18:30: At Gisèle’s place. It’s fab.
18:56: Got the tour. Met her partner Bernard. I’m invited for dinner! Delicious vegetables. I’m going to get changed into long-sleeved clothes for dinner. Gisèle has a relief map of les Vosges which makes it clear how the terrain is arranged. Really helpful!
21:37: Lovely, relaxed dinner with Gisèle and Bernard. Roasted veggies with home-grown salad, accompanied by bread and cheese and followed by home-made rhubarb tart, which had just the right level of tartness. We chatted about Turkey’s growing conservatism and Erdoğan’s bid to be president for life, as well as the inauguration of France’s new president, Macron. I said it must have been tough standing in the voting booth on May 7 having to choose between a straight-down-the-line establishment social democrat and Marine Le Pen. “We voted for the least dangerous candidate”, Gisèle said. But there was no satisfaction in it at all. On TV, a tiny crowd of a few hundred welcomed Macron at Paris’ Hôtel de Ville, the residence of Paris’ Mayor. It looked like police and security outnumbered the well-wishers.
Gisèle also showed me a brochure of cultural and historical options in the town. There’s an imposing old castle on the hill — visible from the house — a pretty old town square and a “museum of images” the latter being religious and mythic paintings for which Épinal is famous.
I’ll visit the tourist office with my maps to get them to help me plot a walking route through the mountains and I’ll find out about access to refuges, campings and places to get provisions.
We’ve arranged to have breakfast at 08:00. The tourist office, a five or ten minute walk away, opens at 09:00.
I’ve also put a bunch of clothes in the washing machine. They’ll dry quickly tomorrow. I’ll post home my beloved but redundant yoga t-shirt that I’ve not worn once so far.
