In the Heart of the Mountains

Having said farewell to Toulouse, we travelled by train to Lourdes, the closest train station to our destination: the Pyrenees, a fantastic destination for hiking. We discovered that we had some time before the next bus left so we found a supermarket and stocked up with very cheap food, especially on sandwiches (an inexpensive way to stay fed). 

A series of three buses were required to bring us all the way to Gavarnie, totaling about an hour and a half of riding. We had a layover in Luz and took advantage of a library thingy there to access the Internet. That's where the previous teaser post came from. 

Gavarnie was a small town. No, really. A shop or two, a few small hotels and hostels (closed until the ski season), and one or two farms made up the whole place. There was supposedly a campsite as well, where we planned to sleep. We found that it had closed a week ago after some investigation. Unfortunately, as mentioned before, the other hotels were not open yet. On the brink of deciding to camp in a random field, we came upon a rustic hostel that was unlocked yet had absolutely nobody inside. Not even a manager or housekeeper. We waited for a good 40 minutes until a man showed up. He let us inside (not like it was difficult or anything; the door was unlocked), gave us a short tour in French, and told us we'd pay in the morning. Then he left. 

I really thought it was interesting that he would do that. For all he knew, we couldn't stolen anything we wanted. There was plenty of beer on the cabinets in easy reach, and probably food in the cabinets. I hate beer anyways, and we're the honest type of travelers, so we behaved. But the trust amazed me. That's not something you'd find in America. 

After we paid in the morning, we left our main packs in the hostel and decided to take a hike. Being an avid hiker and outdoorsman, I was ready to go back to where I belong. We climbed up a ways to an angel statue on a steep hill, which turned out to be a shrine of some sort. Then we set our sights on a nearby mountain - our goal for the day. 

The first obstacle we faced was a fence. When you think of an electric fence, you think of humming metal wires. Right? This fence was just one strand of a material that looked synthetic. After joking about getting shocked by it, I went to push it up to climb under and got a small jolt. It felt almost like static. Being a scientist at all, I decided to test whether it was just a bad static charge or if the fence was electric by touching it again. Long story short: Electric fences aren't always metal.

We climbed quite a while. There was no trail on this mountain, but there no trees so it was not hard to navigate through the long grass and shrubs towards the top. I will say this: Cow pies were everywhere. This was a very tall mountain, and eventually we started wondering how the he'll the cows got up there XD since we found them all the way to the top. 

There were points where it got steep enough to institute a 3 points rule - in order to stay balanced, you had to have three points of contact with the mountainside at all times. This was mostly only because it was wet and there were loose rocks. But falling would have been bad. 

We got close to what we thought was the top several times. I warned David about false peaks, but he didn't listen until we got to "the top" and found still another slope. 

It was amazing when we reached to top. It was not the hardest peak I've climbed, nor the highest, nor the longest climb, but it had the best views I'd ever seen. 360 panoramic views of the valley below and sheer rock and ice walls of surrounding mountains. Cliffs stretching in all directions. Clouds rolling in BELOW us. Snow covering nearby peaks. It was fantastic. We added our stones to the cairn at the peak and started down. 

Nothing much interesting about the climb down, except that it was much quicker than coming up. :P

We took a bus back to Luz and slept in a hotel there. Again, we were the only guests, although the owners were there this time. 

Once we got back to Lourdes, we had 10 hours to wait until our train. And we couldn't even explore because we had our packs - not that we'd want to anyways, since there's not much to see in Lourdes. It's a place of pilgrimage for Catholics since some farm girl saw the virgin Mary appear, but neither of us are Catholic - and although I'm vaguely religious, I don't put any faith in ghosts popping up everywhere.

Our train arrived after 10 hours of mind-bending boredom. I'm surprised I didn't go insan-AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Sorry. Random fit of maniacal laughter. Those are normal, right?

The train to Paris was an overnight one, and we figures we could sleep on the train and save a bunch of cash. We also miscalculated how comfortable the seats would be. I slept for 6 hours or so just because I can sleep under any conditions, but it was not a restful night either way. When I woke up, though...we were in Paris! :D