Monday, Day  22
0
Oloron
Visited Col d'Aubisque by car. No snow but pass closed! Lazed around. Ate. Lazed. Ate.

Day  23
85km to Aire s'l'Adour. A hot, hazy, rolling up and down ride through Pau where I bought some new sunglasses having dropped my first pair. Thundery rain towards the end of the day. Though knees are still a bit tender I feel much better.

Day 24
91,5km to through Condom to Lamontjoie, 6km short of Agen. We arrived as heavens opened – a very wet end to the day. Good but empty campsite. The owner was most helpful and opened the grill bar just for us! He later came to check that the shower water was hot enough – it was scalding! Load of frogs - so many in fact that I fear I will not be able to walk to the toilet block without treading on one. During the day I spoke to some pilgrims en route to Compostella  who had  been forced off the GR route by rain damage to path.

Day 25
86km to Villereal having crossed Lot & Garonne rivers.  Villareal is  a pretty little Dourdogne village with a charming town square. The campsite isn’t really open but the water is hot at least. We manage to cook our food before the now traditional evening downpour.

Day 26
82,5 km across Dordogne, through Beaumont to  Cadouin then Le Buisson and Le Bugue  past the troglodyte dwellings hacked into the stone and along the Vézère to Montignac.
Stopped in Cadouin for lunch in the square outside the impressive cathedral-sized church. Peace disturbed and much entertainment provided by arrival of French school trip. Everyone does what they always do on school trips, the teachers hive off to the bar whilst kids throw food and scream at one another. Its takes us back!! A pleasant days cycling despite (or because of?) the longish but steady climbs up from the rivers.  The price of last nights camping was reduced, as the promised fine weather did not hold! The campsite owner regaled us with tales of the previous week's thunderstorm that had struck his very office! Although my French is quite good the whole story is told with much action, rushing from 'melted' fax machine to the telephone cables in the wall. Meet parents again. It transpires they have been 'trailing' us. Driving so slowly must have been taxing!!

Day 27
Montignac 0km. As the UK contingent starts for home I spend a pleasant day in the village, find something to read, visit the Lascaux II caves and chat to an elderly Dutch couple on their way in a camper-van to Gibraltar to visit her father’s 1946 grave.

Day 28
82km to Tulle via Brive (no campsite marked on Michelin map) and Aubazine whose campsite is not in the valley but at the top of a 300m hill! A longer day than intended and a long climb up to the campsite to discover it was closed. I am meant to be meeting my last companion at this site. The owners say I can stay but I don’t fancy camping alone so far from civilisation and with so little food. The campsite in Tulle is open so I leave little notes everywhere for Mikael to find before pushing on. Written on the back of last year's fliers and taped to the campsite road boom with trusty gaffer tape, I even leave a little 'Gone to Tulle, ring me!' notice in the phone booth.  Mikael turned up as I descended. I wonder what the campsite owners made of all my little notes?
 

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