After a quiet breakfast with Pascal and Marie-Luce Olive I first checked with their help for quite a while my itinerary for the rest of the week. Pascal arranged a farrier for Leon, of course Leon. Le Marechal Ferrant, French for blacksmith, beautiful new word I learned, will come Saturday morning at 9 am. to the town hall, on the church square of Châlus, to help my bajke (horse). On the central village square it’ll probably get a lot of attention. Who gives a damn. Therefore I’ll have to change my route again because on Saturday I would have liked to be one day stage further. With the help of my hostess – Mr. Pascal and Marie-Luce Olive, we arranged a few places to stay overnight for this week. I write it here so Gonnie and Niek, two in Limoges living Dutch residents, who want to walk along with me later this week, are informed.
The plans are as follows:
Now, Tuesday at Menno and Henriettes, a Dutch cottage (hostel), called “le Boste” in Thiviers, Wednesday also in Thiviers, Thursday night in La Coquille at mme. Tina Bernet, tel. 0033 (0) 553 524 193. For Friday I still have to book something in Chalus, because Saturday the blacksmith will be there at the church square to save my horse. Tomorrow I’ll plan the further route, past Chalus.
After my departure,which today was a little later than usual, because I only had a short route, I quickly saw I had lost a glove. Fortunately, I saw something black lying on the path, some 100 meters back. I left Leon grazing on the roadside of a quiet road and walked back. Of course Tosca was in front of me and immediately hit the road with my glove. A lot of yelling on my side and I got my glove back. Fortunately, right now no cars. After some searching and after walking some stretches my own way instead of the official pilgrimage route, we arrived at 4 pm. in the lovely old town of Thiviers. The road was blocked by an oil tanker which supplied a house. Leon began protesting again, being afraid of the tanker and had to be trussed up, in order to keep him under control. An anxious Tosca leaping up and down in the other hand and all this in the middle of the traffic. Be cool man !! I still had to go 1.5 km. on the busy main road, by the roadside, before getting to the evening address. Through many detours, I tried to avoid the dangerous busy main road and I eventually I managed to pass the town. It started to drizzle and my luggage was getting wet.
After a very pleasant reception at the estate “le Bost” of Dutch Menno and Henriette, I installed myself in my apartment and went to make arrangements for the rest of the week, blog writing, eating with Henriette and Menno and their 3 lovely, typically Dutch, children: big, blonde, blue-eyed, excited. They always had been in French schools, but spoke perfectly Dutch. Cozy dinner with the children and showing them some card tricks. Nice to see. 8:45 Pm back to my apartment, located next to the house, to make a call, sending SMS and so on.
I would also like to thank everyone who wrote a reaction, SMS too, or called me etc. It supports me and encourages me to continue, even if occasionally things don’t go smoothly. My main, if not only, real big problem is finding shelter each night for myself and my animals. All the rest is no big deal. All together another successful day. Dunking my parchments skin, scrubbing my snout and between the sheets.
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