Day 26: Aire-sur-l’Adour to Pimbo
- Simon Pollack
- May 22, 2024
- 4 min read
Updated: Mar 27
The fleeting views of snow-topped peaks make aches and pains worthwhile
The end in sight, our destination closer by the mile
Pilgrims’ camaraderie not reflected in this town
The services’ up-carvery leaves us feeling rather down
22 May 2024, Wednesday
Distance hiked 27.1km (16.8m) | Ascent 701m |
I saw the Pyrenees today! Leaving Aire you snake your way through the outskirts of town and round a lake, breaking out eventually into countryside less pastoral and rather more arable-industrial than normal for this walk. I remember from last time I did this that I’d found this section a little boring with long straight paths alongside rectangular flat fields. But given I’d rested for a day and was enjoying moving physically again, and given how damned challenging some of the more pastoral sections had been, I just had a spring in my step. It’s fascinating how one’s mindset and mood, as in so much of life, determines one’s enjoyment of the outcomes one faces – the intrinsic plays a bigger role than the extrinsic. And it was enhanced, greatly, by the first views of the Pyrenees, snow-capped in the distance. As the crow flies I think they’re about 100km from where we first set eyes on them, but what a truly inspirational moment this was for it was the finish line laid out ahead of us.
I passed a few pilgrims and said hi, and was passed by a certain Heather from Canada, far younger than me and a real fun character of enterprise and intelligence (as I was later to learn) who was “on a mission” to re-overtake everyone who had passed her, including me, while she’d taken a brief rest stop mid-morning. Heather had just finished a two-year stint as a language teacher at the university of Alsace, in Mulhouse, and was doing a bit of travelling before returning to Edmonton to deal with the next chapter in her life.
After something approaching 20km I reached a little village called Miramont-Sensacq and here an impromptu gathering of nearly a dozen pilgrims, including Richard and Cathy, Marie from the cheat bus, Heather, an Austrian friend she’d met on the walk called Barbara, and a few others, gathered at a little café for a coffee. I asked Cathy if she’d seen the Pyrenees, and pointed out it was the second time she’d seen snow! There was a real community spirit, with bilingual and multilingual stuff happening including English and German, and we all enjoyed the break as it had been a long stint from Aire to here.
Setting off for the final few kilometres to Pimbo I had a spring in my step. I walked it alone, arriving at Le Patio Tursan – the only place in Pimbo that isn’t the gîte communal – around 4pm and reflecting, incredibly, that it was the first day other than when Cat had somehow delivered dry, sunny weather for four days, where it didn’t rain at all. This was my 26th day of walking. Five dry days in nearly 4 weeks! But hold that thought: Paula, the wonderful hostess of the chambres d’hôtes, makes it splendidly welcoming and provides footbath salts of which I gratefully partook, after freshening up, on the eponymous patio. It overlooks the Pyrenees from on high (she says she can see individual skiers with her binoculars, on clear days). There I sat marvelling at the perfection of the world when, of course, the heavens opened. Ho hum.
When I’d arrived I had been surprised to find Heather, Barbara and another Canadian I’d met on the walk today called Catherine, all of whom I’d preceded out of Miramont, already sitting at the bar (the only one in town: “Chez Roxette”). It turns out that to avoid the mud (yes the last two klicks into Pimbo on the signed Chemin were very muddy) they’d read the Miam Miam Dodo about a prior route more on the roads, and taken that. It was a fair bit shorter, and that corresponded with my memory from 5 years ago with Jon. The Chemin isn’t a single route consistent over time. It changes with politics, economics and human geography.
Pimbo is ancient and beautiful with a kind of church known as a Collégiale. This has a definition in the arcaneness of the Catholic administration, but as far as I can tell it is the mean average between a parish church and a cathedral. It has canons, and not of the military sort. But it’s also a pokey town, slightly spooky, and dominated by people whose small-town pettifoggery leaves a bitter taste. Asking Roxette about dinner she informed Catherine that only our hostess (Paula – for Barbara and Catherine were also staying at the Patio) could book for us. It was basically the communal dining hall of the communal gîte: they’d divided it up so they don’t cut each other’s business I suppose. And sure enough Paula helps out with the meal. But what Roxette didn’t tell us, and we had to learn from Paula the following morning, is that she (Roxette) is the only one allowed to stamp Credentials in town. So Paula couldn’t do it for us the next morning. Lordy lord, just get a stamp Paula… “but I don’t want to rock the boat” she said.
Petty and pathetic. And the meal, while tasty, left me a little hungry, as I hadn’t really eaten at lunch, so I resolved to get a sandwich for tomorrow.
In any event, Paula cut out some perfect logos from her business cards and stuck them in our Credentials, beautiful improvisation, and gave us a sterling breakfast the next morning.
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