Day 18 - Quercy Huts and Stone Walls : Lacapelle Marival to Gramat

This morning we managed to escape our dodgy lodgings and circumnavigate the locked front door, largely without infestation we believe. We sat on the steps of the church in the center of town and waited until the bakery opened at 7:15am. We happily procured two chocolate croissants, two regular croissants, and two pocket sized vegetable quiches from the wonderful lady in the bakery. The two chocolate croissants were immediately consumed, and thus fortified we set out from Lacapelle Marival.

We were much encouraged by our impromptu breakfast, but we were missing our morning coffee. We had hopes for the village of Rudelle, which was about 4.5km after Lacapelle Marival. This village turned out to be beautiful, and to have several wonderful looking Gites.

I would recommend investigating this town as a potential place to stay if you are passing this way, especially if La Terras and the Gite in Lacapelle Marival are full. This town had a very impressive fortified church as well, although it wasn't open when we passed through.

On that note, I will take the opportunity to mention that we are carrying both the English Lightfoot guide to the Via Podiensis, and the Miam Miam Dodo guide for the GR65. The MMD has much more information than the Lightfoot one, and we have found ourselves using it frequently. Now that we are on the GR6, our only option is the Lightfoot guide, and we are finding that list of accommodations and recommendations is somewhat incomplete. That said, we are glad to have the guide because it has descriptions of the places we are visiting, and it emphasizes sights and accommodations geared towards pilgrims rather than weekend hikers.

Rudelle did not have coffee, so we continued on into the countryside. The walk was mostly along asphalt roads at this point, and there was a bit of a climb. There were beautiful fields of wheat and quite a few sheep. Not too long after we left the village, it began to rain – first as a light drizzle which wasn't too bad, and then as a torrential rain that was accompanied by a very cold wind. This was extremely unpleasant!

Despite the wind and rain we motored towards the town of Themines, where our guidebook mentioned a bakery. The town had a church, but it and everything else was shuttered up tight, and the bakery turned out to be closed and for sale. This was very disappointing, as we were soaked and freezing, but there was nothing for it but to continue onward.

At some point the rain dwindled and eventually stopped. We walked through the countryside all day. Eventually the asphalt roads were replaced by dirt tracks through fields, and then by earth pathways between mossy stone walls. This last part of the trek, which was about 6 km, was very magical, and by that point the sun was out and had begun to dry us out.

One of the high points of our hike was a visit to the Castelle de Felix.  This was a 140 year old Quercy hut in a field beside the trail that we were able to go into.  It was a quite a good shelter, and fun to visit.

We arrived in Gramat around 1:30, about 2 hours before the gite opened. We are staying in Les Petits Cailloux, which is run by volunteers and based on donations. We visited the church, which is very impressive, and walked around the town, which is a well preserved medieval village.

There are many stores featuring local products, ranging from black nut cake, to wine, to Rocamadour cheese, as well as several bakeries and butchers stores.

It is a well supplied town, and seems to be rather busy. Given our more recent experiences in many small villages, Gramat is a welcome change, allowing us to resupply and relax.

Once we checked in, we discovered that the gite is incredible! It is gorgeous inside and the volunteers are extremely friendly and nice! The rooms are spacious and clean, and they have the nicest showers we have seen anywhere! The volunteers are very friendly and creative, and the communal meal was a joy.  We would definitely highly recommend this place!

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Practical Information:

 
Distance: 24.6 km

Max Temperature: 17˚C

Accommodations: Giteles Petits Cailloux du Chemin (donation)