Stage 10 : And so into Switzerland

It was pouring with rain as we stepped out the next morning. Thankfully, Polly had a spring her step and was thrilled with her new purchases. On the main street we were stopped by someone who told us he was a local journalist. Were we walking to Rome? Could he take our photographs? Thrilled and a bit embarrassed about being local celebrities, we were snapped along with our pilgrim passports. What fun! I wonder if they were ever published.

Our route to us out of town and soon started to climb steeply. We had a rather misty view of the Chateau du Joux and a brief cliff edge walk. Then it was uphill again to our first 1000 metre mark. We descended all the way back to the road, slithering and sliding all the way as the rain poured down heavily. It really was a dangerous descent. I was much relieved when we got back to road level unscathed. Wait a minute...we've been here before. We turned up past that discount store...Hang about...So we've walked all the way uphill and all the way down it and for what??? A murky view of the chateau?


Spirits were a bit low. We trudged on along the N57; the rain bucketing down on us. Eventually, we came to a bar. We were too late for lunch, but decided to stop for a drink and get out of the rain. By this stage we only had about 5k to walk to our overnight stop in Les Fourges but we decided to sit tight and see and if the rain would ease off. It didn't. We started talking the some locals and they were fascinated by our story. They wanted to know where we were heading for tonight. When we told them, one of them (the big one who looked a bit like Obelix, Asterix's chum) volunteered to take us there in his car. We looked at each other...it didn't take us long to agree and thank him for his kind offer. We clambered into the car; sharing it with tools, broken bits of furniture, bottles, bags and half eaten sandwiches. We didn't really care. Our new chum, Obelix, somehow managed to get in the car, even tough he seemed bigger than it, and off we went at breakneck speed. We were there in three minutes. It would have taken us about an hour and a half to walk it in these conditions. We were very, very grateful. I ricked my back pulling my rucksack out of the car.

Les Forges sits on a little plateau, looking for all the world like a Swiss town. I bet they had some wild winters round here. After a shower and a siesta to ease my back, the rain had stopped so we went out for a stroll round town to check out where we could have supper. There were only two likely places. One was closed and didn't look like it would be opening anytime soon. The other was a very quiet bar/tabac type of place. We weren't too optimistic. There was no menu but the (land)lady said she could get us something. It didn't seem promising. We had an excellent charcuterie plate to start with and followed this with turkey, cauliflower and the ubiquitous chips. It was simple but superb. Polly notes in her diary that 'we have been shown such kindness.' Another great example of the generosity we have been shown in France.

After a very disturbed night, (the wind howled a gale (at least it might have been blowing the rain away) and my back was agony) we awoke to a wild sky, black and forbidding, with a shady of weak sunlight at the edges. We hoped for the sun but feared the clouds.

We were at the Swiss border in no time. It seemed to be unstaffed. We wondered if we should make ourselves known...but there was no-one around. Surreal. It felt weird as we walked out of France. We'd been walking for over a month and had such a marvellous time. I was going to miss France. Ahead lied Switzerland, a new adventure.


Yet we were both tired. My back was hurting and Polly had developed a very sore foot. We were feeling down and getting irritable and argumentative.


We were beginning to wonder whether we could carry on.