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07:08: Up and out of bed.
08:49: Breakfasted on porridge, washed, dressed, socks washed, packed.
08:58: Heading out onto the street after goodbyes. Anne-Marie is a gourmet, of organic and food-as-medicine type. She was chopping up a duck when I arrived in the kitchen to make my breakfast.
My legs and feet have benefitted from the rest day. I’m glad to be moving again.
09:26: In the town centre, at the junction where I turn east, there’s a boulangerie where I bought two baguettes for €2.20. I’ve kept the paper bags from previous purchases so each baguette now has its own bag. The side tubes on the day pack — which is my pantry, hooked permanently to the outside of my rucksack — seem to be custom made to hold baguettes. Storing bread for the day hasn’t been a problem since I discovered them a couple of weeks ago.
09:41: There’s a lovely old covered market which is still functioning as a place to buy fresh produce. It’s quite buzzing in a low-key French sleepy town kind of way. I’m stopping to put on my sun hat, remove a stone from my shoe and shed a layer. I still need to buy butter.
10:20: Leaving St. Dizier.
10:36: Earplugs in.
10:37: Since leaving the town centre of St. Dizier, I’ve been walking uphill. At the crest I can see more rolling hills ahead of me. It’s good to be back in this kind of landscape after several days in the canal flats. I haven’t walked among hills since coming down from the vineyards in [previous place] on [previous date].
The sun is bright, but I suspect not that warm, considering I’m still wearing two layers after a long uphill plod.
10:49: Stopped to take a stone from my shoe and sup some water.
10:59: Ancerville. Population: 2,800.
11:08: Turning downhill into the town centre to find a little supermarket where I can buy butter.
11:15: Proxi supermarket. Butter, four fruit yoghurts, a pear: €5.02. I had a one cent piece, but she wouldn’t take it and gave me €4.98 in coins no larger than 50c.
11:37: Thoroughly enjoyed the four yoghurts for my elevenses. The butter is double-bagged in ziplock bags in the lower half of my pack. Back to the road!
12:48: Stopped for lunch at the turn for La Houpette.
13:46: Moving again.
14:05: Just remembered I was supposed to accept or reject an AirBnB special offer from my host at Toul. Sitting down to sort that out now.
14:22: Done. Accepted for €46.00. Moving.
15:54: Stainville. Population: 400.
16:08: Leaving Stainville. It’s a pretty little town in a bend in the road, with faded hand-painted adverts on many of the houses.
16:41: Nant le Petit.
16:43: Looking closely at my map, I see I can avoid the detour to Nant le Petit and Nant le Grand, instead burrowing under the motorway via Maulan. I’m backtracking up the hill now to do that.
17:04: Stopped for ten minutes to fold the new map for the rest of today’s walk. Looking good, feeling good. The sun is out and the temperature is mild. I hear grasshoppers.
18:43: Just a kilometre and a bit outside Ligny-en-Barrois. Apart from the access roads, it’s all dense forest and there are no nice places to hide in the no-man’s-land between the roads. I bookmarked a likely spot a kilometre or two back up the hill so I’m backtracking there now.
19:18: I’ve found somewhere that’s discreet but open to the sky. Need to see if I can drive a stake into the ground here.
19:25: Nope, ground too hard and the only green patch nearby has hog trails through it. I can also hear them in the forest.
19:42: Inspecting another likely spot, I found a badger burrow right in the middle of it. I think I saw his snout down in the hole.
19:58: Right, I’m at the spot I bookmarked before. It’s still quite marginal — but I am invisible from the road and practically invisible fromm the motorway. There are trails through the undergrowth and there’s an empty sardine can and an empty yoghurt container, so someone else has wild camped here in the not-too-distant past. It also makes it clear that spots around here are hard to come by.
I have 45 minutes to get set up and eat dinner before sunset. Dinner will be bread and butter, if it’s anything.
20:48: The ground is too hard to drive a stake into.
21:26: Wow, basha up. I can’t read this text! Basha is suspended from trees. Really effective!
