Freeway Free in France: Looping back to Souillac
It was hard to tear ourselves away from our luxury hotel on the outskirts of Carsac this morning. In fact, Winifred and Dianne failed utterly, opting to take the sag wagon with the luggage back to Souillac. Turns out the pickup time was not until 3PM, so they had almost a whole day of lounging around the pool eating bonbons.
Meanwhile DM reconsidered her idea of a solo stroll, so the two of us set out promptly just after 9AM to regain the converted train right of way now known as “Le Voie Verte” -the Green Way. This is a lovely hiking, biking and jogging path with a nice shallow grade going along past quaint little towns, distant castles, through tunnels, and along the Dordogne River. We missed the first castle as the fog had not yet lifted, but compensated by exploring the next little town Aillac, a fabulously pretty little yellow Winkie village with some really cute cats and kittens outside a barn, and an amazingly clean set of public toilettes. We hikers appreciate these things!
We made very good time on the Green Way, even overtaking and passing the Australian couple who had been besting us in previous days – however, we were not held back by DB and WB, and the Australians had made a wrong turn. We tried to stop for a snack at the halfway point, but the season had officially ended on the 19th, the snack shops were closed, and the one open restaurant was out of Coca-cola, Dory’s secret vice.
Once we ran out of Green Way, things took an upward turn – waaaay up to the top of a small mountain where we found the village of Millac, but were too exhilarated at being able to stand up straight and see for miles to spend time exploring yet another crumbling church.
Then it was down through dappled shade and dappled sun in a woodsy canyon, then down further through more dappled shade and dappled sun as we crossed a series of walnut orchards with beautifully shaped and spaced trees, then down further into the tacky outskirts of Souillac, then down past the cemetery. We got confused, asked a passerby if he knew our hotel, and he pointed to it across the street. Winifred and Dianne had just arrived.
I took a short walk up down with Dory to locate a Coke for the train tomorrow, and we wandered a little bit more through the old medieval section of Souillac. We were surprised to see that a small two story townhome in this section, with 2 BR, 2WC, and two other “pieces” which could be used as a “salon” or a BR, was en venue for around 135K euros – seemed a lot considering how many empty shop fronts we had been seeing.
The area is suffering from gentrification – so many wealthy Brits have bought old hones in the area and are restoring them, that housing prices are going up for everyone. Sounds eerily familiar.
Tonight we expect another luxury dinner, but must leave early tomorrow to catch our 8:25 train to Paris. Maybe we will spot Hercule Poirot.
Unfortunately WB has developed some problems with her knee and has not been able to hike for the last couple of days, but she has gotten a free ride in the luggage van and enjoyed some leisure. The other three have enjoyed walking through the countryside on back roads and grassy trails, sampling wild blackberries, feral figs, late-season asparagus sprouts, and sunflower seeds.
By noon we were looking for luncheon options, and happily came upon a small shop in a small village which had, to DM’s delight, cold Coca-Cola available. We purchased a few other snacks and continued until we found a convenient stone to serve as both stools and table. We enjoyed the sun, sipping and munching, then snuck through a gap in the wall for a view of the Chateau de Montfort (privately held, unfortunately) 
Domme is a medieval island perched on top of a bluff, too remote from normal four-lane roads to have been changed much by the advent of the automobile. As we trudged up the winding road, we were wishing for a donkey cart!
This day was the scenic highlight of our walking – we stayed the previous night at Beynac, beneath the cliff topped by the medieval fortress which we had wandered through the afternoon before. After our breakfast of croissants, cafe au lait, and local yogurt and strawberries, and after wrestling our luggage down three flights of narrow stairs, DM, DB, and I set out along the “grassy track” by the Dordogne River. (W has developed a painful knee after too many ups and downs and decided to cop a ride in the van.). The path led along the river through woodsy patches – lots of bird calls, some families of ducks on the water, the occasional fisherman, the occasional egret. We stayed mostly level through a series of acricultural meadows and fields (DM sampled the sunflower seeds, I sampled the fresh asparagus spears pushing up from the ground) and took turns pointing out the yellow sandstone castles on the successive cliffs – Beynac behind us, its hated rival Castelroud across the river on the English side.
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Our next stint was up and over easy hills, on back roads through small villages. We came across an old church, with a charming graveyard adjacent. Such a contrast to the cemeteries in my neighborhood, where one has a choice of three different styles of stone, and one may not leave anything on the stone which would impede a power lawn mower! Here were live flowers in pots and personalized tributes from family members – one could construct an entire village history from the mementoes pile atop the sacophogi!
For hours it seemed like a mirage, always visible, yet never nearer. Then suddenly we were there, on the highlands adjacent to the castle, looking out past the fortifications to the valley of the Dordogne far below.
I am a big fan of public transit, taking the train regularly to Sacramento and San Francisco to visit family, taking BART to the Symphony or to museums in San Francisco, riding Light Rail and Muni in San Jose and San Francisco.
Having figured out the advantage of attracting tourists to their market on Saturday morning, the city fathers of Sarlat have lost no time in figuring out ways to keep those walking cash dispensers in town as long as possible. On the Saturday of our stay we were tempted back onto the streets long after the market closed with 
At about the halfway point of our first day of hiking (9km) we felt raindrops. Drizzle turned to gentle rain, enough to rate dragging out our rain gear – all except DB, who had left her poncho behind to save weight. (DB has some curvature of the spine and her backpack is not very comfortable, so she chose to leave some basic stuff, including sufficient water. Fortunately both W and I tend to err in the opposite direction, and were able to keep her hydrated with our extra bottles, and fairly dry with my little polka-dot umbrella.). The ponchos added an unnecessary extra layer of warmth, so we kept trying to do without every time we felt the rain slacken, and then had to re-don when we got out of the sheltering woods or the rain renewed its attack.
We oohed and ached over a chateau whose ruined towers loomed above the woods on the left (it was burned by the Nazis in WWII) and exclaimed over weird fungi growing on logs and near the edges of the path. We noted pear orchards, apple trees heavy with fruit, an occasional vineyard lush with grapes awaiting harvest. We sampled wild blackberries at the side of the road, and tried to open chestnut husks to get at the chestnuts inside. (Chestnuts are stickery!” And we were counting down the remaining KM by tenths.
We were dropped off in Roufillac after a brief orientation on French hiking route markings, and told to “go between the houses and up the path”. Packs on back, hiking sticks in hand, we set off. The sky was partly cloudy, the temperature was in the low 70s, couldn’t have been nicer for our purposes. We wound up through wooded hills past houses and barns built of glowing yellow sandstone, some with tile roofs, many with stone roofs. We came to a small village perched at the top of the hill and realized we had climbed quite far, and there was a ruined castle inviting us to explore just at the tip of the cliff overlooking the valley.
Allyson Johnson 