Conques to Najac

We were on our way around 7.30 today, but as it happens we were not even close to being the first. There were three hikers, pilgrims we assume, who left at 6.10! The day was quite overcast, it was a bit of a worry but I assured Paul it wouldn't rain, it never does when you're cycle touring:) There was no where to eat here at this time of the morning so we rode on to St Cyprien for breakfast, not far. We then continued on down the road and some how managed to miss the next turn. We were about 8 K's away, expecting to come to some town when we arrived at the town of Marillac, quite unexpected. Fortunately it didn't matter, we just went a slightly different way. Marillac is actually a wine region, one we'd both heard of before, but alas for Paul we can't do any tasting today :)


The real bummer on leaving Marillac was the huge hill! A 3 K climb, not that steep but unrelenting. After we got over it we had a bunch of rolling hills, very pleasant, before descending down into the town of Rignac. We were making good progress, which was good since we wanted to do a reasonable distance today. I ate a pain au raison that I had saved from breakfast. Paul wanted to get a drink so we sat at the bar and I had a coke and Paul a coffee. There was a family of young Dutch kids playing with a tiny puppy. The puppy wanted food and kept coming back to Paul. He could probably smell the goose fat :)

We eventually had to leave and then we did actually get a little bit lost, maybe 4 extra K's. The problem was there were no signs, we followed the route out that we wanted but then the signs stopped. Somehow we ended up east when we were supposed to be going west. In due course we got on the right road and then there were a lots of hills, rolling hills, and they were actually pretty pleasant. I was really getting into the riding today, it was probably the best I've felt with Paul so far this trip! After many K's of up and down we had a great descent into the town of Villefranche-de-Rouergue.


Villefranche was a great town, their annual fair was on, there were market stalls everywhere! I was dead keen to finish the day there, after all we'd done 65 K's already, but Paul wouldn't stay :( We walked through the town, heaps of eating places, we found a restaurant at the far end of town, it was a hotel too, and it was cheap. But no, we had to ride further today. Bum. We did however have a nice lunch, 4 course naturally, a real bloat up. The service was very slow, it took over 2 hours, and we didn't leave until 2.30 pm! There was soup, two different self service bowls. One was a light chicken soup with little pasta bits, we thought they were lentils at first. The second soup was a pork and vegie soup with baguette in it, very hearty. Then there was a large plate of salad which we split in half. Then they brought out three plates of vegies and then a huge platter of chicken and stuffing. It was a lot, in fact we couldn't finish it! Finally there was a simple fruit tart with some fresh fruit. Yep, we were definitely stuffed.


When we finally set off it was stinking hot! Somehow I missed another turn, bloody signs again. We just continued on and turned back onto the planned route a bit further on. Did I mention it was stinking hot? The road here was not very nice, a newly resealed with gravel road, piles of gravel everywhere. Eventually we got to Montiels(?) and the start of a humongous hill to climb. It was so hot, and there were hardly any trees. It was only 2 K's so even with panniers I don't think it was as bad as Tawonga Gap in the Alpine Classic. There was of course a great descent down into the valley where Najac is and the camping was right there, so in we went. No argument from Paul, there was no way he wanted to go up that hill with the bike. In fact I discovered after we'd showered and done the washing etc. that in fact Paul didn't even want to walk up the hill to the town. I made him anyway :)


The town has a really great fort at the top of the hill, in fact at the top of a hill on top of the valley ridge, but it was really worth while. The fort is reasonably well preserved, the main Keep is accessible all the way to the top where the clock tower is. The stairs though are steep, high and narrow. Definitely not good if you get vertigo. While we were at the top the bell rang the half hour, very loud. We walked back down, and then up, into town. It was a nice town, not as good as Conques, but nice all the same. We checked out the dinner places and since we had eaten such a large lunch decided to have only one course. I got lamb with vegies, very tasty, Paul had a plate of vegies and salad. Of course we need some dessert after that, a nice sorbet seemed the best choice.

It was a very hot night so I actually lay for a while with my head out of the tent staring at the stars in order to enjoy the cooling winds while I waited for the tent itself to cool down.