We’re approaching a similar(ish) post-eye op situation and I’ve been told that I’ll have to have completed all my sanding by Monday (faux mediaeval replacement cave door).
Apparently from Tuesday onwards my wife (who’s normally an obsessive vacuumer) will be unable to do any housework for at least a month because of the dust. Hmm…
Oh at least a month. And can’t possibly make tea due to steam from kettle. And needs soothing environment at all times to maximise healing waves.
Thanks I’ll bear all that in mind and go on holiday!
That’s alright then, according to Quentin Crisp, the Naked Civil Servant, dust only collects to a certain, low, level, and then builds up no more. 
I think his critical threshold was ‘after the first four years’, but happy to be corrected.
Meanwhile re randos…
Christmas Day walk was a bit challenging, though not on account of terrain or altitude, simply finding a time and a place where one might be able to see beyond a few metres.
In our valley, the morning mist reluctantly lifted a bit, but then decided to stick around for the rest of the day about 100m above the Lot.
Consequently we decided to walk up on the plateau above the mist. The road up to the top is a single track with ditches all the way, very few passing points and a drop of hundreds of metres as you climb. got about halfway up without meeting anyone coming down but by this time visibility was nil and had to drive all the way to the top before turning round. Noticed a lot of cars at the salle de chasse at the top. Don’t know if they were hunting in zero visibility or having Christmas drinks or both, but another reason for going back down.
Possible horror movie title - Drunken Hunters in the Mist ?
Ended up walking in the commune’s fields in a meander of the Lot where the valley’s much wider and the conditions very different to our place a couple of kms downstream.
Cold and damp with the smell of brassicas hanging in the air, and crap light for photos, so these are simply documentation. though this one’s obviously influenced by early Andreas Gursky
There’s about three hundred metres of hillside hidden by the mist
This dead tree covered in ivy and the old grange, that are gradually merging into one, draws me back time and again as an image. It’s like something from early Dutch landscape painting, but also something more that one could study obsessively if one was a painter. Unfortunately I don’t paint and my wife is an ‘all-over’ painter rather than someone who creates solid iconic imagery.
And that was our walk. Things will get better
This is a lovely walk and I intended to take more photos but so intent on keeping pooch under control that only managed one. St Roman de la Roche, a lovely romanesque chapel. The acoustics are great and occasionally there are tiny concerts there
Our Boxing Day walk (post-Christmas pig-out walk) this afternoon set out from just above Besse Saint Anastasie and headed through and around the forest next to the Puy de Pertuyzat, and then over to the top ridge of the Lac Pavin crater, and back again over the nearby hillock with a view over most of the Sancy range and the Super-Besse ski resort. The lowish altitude (the walk skirts around the 1200m asl mark) meant that we were only just at the snowline, and even though it was only about 7°C at its highest, that is hot enough to cause the remaining snow to melt even further. More snow is slated for the end of the first week of January 2025, so we shall see, but this has been a continuing trend for the area over the past 10 years or so - warmer, and wetter, with more snow only at the higher altitudes (1600m and above). Fortunately, today was glorious, once we’d got out of the clag in the valleys.
Looking north east towards the Puy de Pertuyzat:
The Puy de Dôme to the north looking like a little sad and lonely pimple in the distance:
Looking west, the Sancy range seen from the Super-Besse side, with the Puy de la Perdrix and Puy de Sancy rising up behind (centre):
Another lovely walk that didn’t turn out as planned. La Croix Rochette at St Maur often has a 360 degree view and is a nice circular walk with a pretty village said to have the most beautiful stone in France.
However, slipped when trying to cross /ford stream as was very icy and landed flat on my back in the river, with my leg jammed beneath me by a rock. So took 10 minutes or more to get out by which time I was soaked through up to armpits. Dog was not bothered. But no permanent damage bar a few bruises.
Take care people!
Thankfully you got out in time before hypothermia took hold. As you say Take care.
Yes, it was a very cold squelchy walk back to the car as was below freezing today. But happily adrenaline made it most of the way. I really must work on my abs next year!
It sounded nasty. I’m glad you didn’t suffer too much.
Glad you ‘bounced’ Jane - do look after yourself.
Lovely, so serene, shades of Caspar David Friedrich?
Though from the sublime to the ridiculous, it also reminded me of Irish graveyards where I’ve seen malfunctioning LED Holy Marys flash on and off.
Meanwhile our far more mundane walks have produced little of note. The south bank of the Lot Valley is deep and shady and frosty and our stretch of the north bank, while sunny, doesn’t have a continuous footpath. And up on the plateau where it’s sunny all day long there’s probably hunters. so we ended up in a fairly boring stretch of the Lot.
Nevertheless it was thought provoking because there resulted an interesting ‘crinkle’ in our personal time/space continuum , summarised in the following conversation (which some couples may find familiar)
“Where are you going?”
“You said ‘we can park by the boat’” (a floating resto on the Lot)
“But that’s not where I meant”
“But it’s where the boat is.”
“I meant where it is in the summer.”
“Oh…”
Pondering our conversation afterwards, I realised that for my wife ‘the boat’ was actually a ‘place’ where for five months of the year one might see ‘the boat’ albeit even then only at certain times of day.
Ah, the consolations of philosophy…
And as for the boat…?
currently it looks very ghostly
But otherwise, a cold, but very symmetrical day…
Not my photos but a trip some may enjoy
Horrors, I’m glad you got out unscathed.
First walk of 2025, but more importantly first proper walk together since August 2024.
Finally a window of opportunity in between my wife’s series of convalescences. Super cold morning (at least for chez nous) - first frost for years, but fortunately soon gave way to sun and friendly afternoon temps.
So I planned a variation on an often posted walk from the next village downstream on the northern side of the Lot Valley, but with a new variation to avoid really rough terrain on the descent on account of wife’s cataract convalescence). Pleased, it was a good route that also added a couple of kilometres (10.5) so it felt more of a 'proper walk.
We started in Bouillac and this is the latest addition to the village, our second micro-brewery within a 10 km radius despite (as recently posted on another thread) being at the centre of the the largest low density pop. part of France. Very new, with erratic opening times, but makes a fine IPA. Incidentally our other local micro-brewery is now making a ‘Session IPA’ (3.5%).
Haven’t yet got my head around French ‘session IPAs’, but it seems a good idea.
Back to the walk - there’s going to be a new second to last house in the village - great site, halfway up te valley side, a few hundred metres above the rive, facing SW. Like the French willingness to build new, non-pastiche homes mixed in with ones that are centuries old (though given the location only a few of the traditionally built houses are pre-C20th (the colombage looking too straight is one give-away).
OTOH in our village 4kms upstream it’s all authentically mediaeval, albeit a lot scruffier, with much of it semi-squalid and unrestored. But interesting! Our dream is that if all the old houses were renovated it’d be eligible to become a plus beaux village. So not holding our collective breath on that one. In the meantime, we retain our integrity as part of la France profonde authentique…
Not that this is what one might expect in la France profonde - c’est la France profo po-mo!
Getting near the top, meanwhile sun sinking…
For landscape photography, I prefer them in pink - would have been great in the photo above.
And I don’t believe that means the farmers are gay!
There ensued an interlude along the top as some other walkers going the other way round shot a video of Gigi.
But then despite (apparently) being French the man asked, something like, <<Quel genre de chien est-ce ? >> !!!
Low winter sun illuminating the silver birch
Going down, we see our village is still in the sun, nestled against the Lot.
Walking back down on a copper path of chestnut leaves glowing in the setting sun
Further down a last field of new grass still catching the light of the falling sun. Impossible to reproduce the intensity of its green
So first proper walk of the year, first walk since March not in shorts and trekking sandals, first proper walk with wife since August. A good start to 2025!
How is Madame’s recovery from the auto accident? Is it complete? And have you got the insurance co to cough up for a fair replacement vehicle? Did the police charge the other driver at least with dangerous driving yet?
Thanks Karen, She’s getting there - there’s s many aspects to it. So in yoga, she’s strong enough to do the Tree, but there are many other poses that aren’t yet possible. She goes to kiné once a week and we don’t know for how long that will go on - so that’s a rolling cost to be claimed back.
The rest of the money started coming in a couple of weeks ago, but there’s hopefully another €10,000 still to come. We negotiated a higher valuation on the car, though I still think it was too low. Don’t know what the situation is with the other driver, other than she was obviously culpable and we have pressed charges on the advice of the police.
Good news to a point then and I’m pleased that you didn’t fall into the same trap as me when Fran broke her hip years ago when doing a violent (and effective) emergency stop to avoid a collison with a dog. We tried to claim all the expenses incurred months later and the insurance simply said, ‘out of time you should have told us at the time.’
