St Guilhem is Grabels, 34.9 km
It should have been less than 35 km, but I wasn’t paying attention at the 31 km mark and I walked to the gîte in the centre of the town, when the gîte I had a reservation at was 1.8 km before the centre. At least the section I had to backtrack over was a very pretty walk alongside the river that flows through the town.
My hosts tonight are the most wonderful couple. Although listed as a gîte, you are really being invited into their home, and after 30 nights in a wide variety of accommodations, this is very special. On this part of the camino the available places to stay are not ideally spaced, therefore today was a long day, but tomorrow will be a much shorter day. My hosts say that is a good thing as apparently Montpellier is a great place to have a coffee and people watch!
Today’s walk started early, as last night was more like a hospital than a hostel, with 3 of the 6 occupants coughing. One lady sounded quite ill, and seemed oblivious about the risks of spreading whatever virus she has to other pèlerins. When they say ‘the camino provides’ I’m not sure this is what they had in mind.
The initial “path” this morning was the edge of the road. The Herault gorge is one of France’s more famous geographic features, but by driving the road up the canyon you can’t actually see it, and there are no pull outs – at least not in the section from St Guilhem to the exit. Walking along the edge of the road you can peer over the concrete safety barrier into the abyss!
At the end of the gorge the trail hits the vineyards, and I was nervously thinking that I was back in Puglia. Fortunately that wasn’t the case – at least not yet – and the day was a mostly pleasant stroll through pine groves, horse farms and other sundry agricultural activities. I had anticipated more urban sprawl, but so far That’s not the case. The trail itself was quite harsh in places, with lots of sections of exposed rock mixed with gnarly stones, which made the walking slow. And not to forget the sections where the path does double duty as a stream in the rainy season. A hard day in the knees for sure!
2saunter 