Bon Courage

Mind:
Walking through tiny towns with backpacks you tend to get noticed. People watering their gardens, or walking their dogs, or riding their bikes all say bonjour and give us big approving smiles (smiles that can easily be associated with confusion, or mockery, but I try and assume it is approval).Every so often someone will say "bon courage"which apparently means what it sounds like. And at first I thought this whole pilgrim thing was silly. Its kind of ridiculous for a nonbeliever like myself to be doing this massive trek to pay homage to a disciple of jesus. We get showers most nights, have great couchsurfing hosts a lot and are yet to sleep in the streets. We listen to MP3 players, (though my ipod did die recently and it wasn't total tragedy), have sweat wicking shirts, camelbaks, special laundry soap and pocket knives. So its hardly the courageous journey filled with religious fervor that precedes us. At first when people said bon courage (well, to be honest at first I couldn't even hear it because I couldn't separate words in French)I thought haha another silly archaic piece of this pilgrimage thing, but I'm slowly beginning to realize that the walk itself doesn't necessarily reaquire courage but a persistence of mind. I have the same thoughts of quitting in the same tone of inner monologue as I had when quitting smoking cigarettes. THis voice that says, Oh come on, you don't really want to do this anymore do you? I mean this is getting ridiculous. Just go sit down at that bus stop, wait for the bus and catch a ride to the next town. You are the only one who will know so just get over it. Quieting these voices is difficult, and it doesn't get any easier. But it is so satisying to take that last step into a town, sit down at a tiny cafe, drink the first sip of coffee, and stare at people you know you will never see again.

Body:
I lost my first toenail the other day. No biggie, just the pinky, can't figure out why i even had it in the first place.

Progress:
We have walked about 650 kilometers and have about 1000 to go. We arrive in Bordeaux tomorrow, will rest a few days with some couchsurfers there, take a day trip to Lacanau, a semi-famous beach on the west coast, and start walking through a huge national forest on Thursday. If all goes according to plan we will be in Spain by July 27...THe scenery has been solid sunflowers until about three days ago when we started seeing vineyards, and now we are constantly surrounded by them. We walked through Cognac, and are now making our way through the Medoc wine region. Haven't tasted much wine, cold beer is the only alcohol I crave, but I did get to taste this great apertif called Pineau that one of our couchsurfing hosts father had made. Sooooo delicious. SO now its on to national forest and the the Pyrenes and then Spain...

Walk, Forrest, Walk

We have almost made it to Poitiers. Last night we stayed with an amazing couple who had a garden that seemed to grow more diverse produce than is avalaible at major grocery stores. Rasberries, champagne berries, melons, lettuce, peaches, nectarines, eggs... we had a beautiful, late dinner, outside and spoke broken English and French until Terje and I both almost fell asleep at the table. The night before we were housed by a church in what turned out to be a small apartment most frequently used as a homeless shelter, but it wasn't so bad, the views were stunning, and we had the place to ourselves to cook and do some laundry. We are slowly adjusting to geting up earlier and earlier: tomorrow we plan to be on the road by 5:30 in the hopes of avoiding the often unavoidable heat in the middle of flat farm land. Walking for hours with no protection from the sun aside from SPF 30 can get quite disorienting; so we are trying to shift things earlier. Terje and I still like each other; but when the thunderstorm that has been waiting to break over our heads for days finally does, we shall see how often we can still make each other laugh...still things are happy and good and simple and fun.