Étapes 39-40
840km from Canterbury, 192km to the Swiss border
I sent my poncho and a few other underused clothes back to Bordeaux the other day when in Langres, so naturally it has rained both days since, after 18 days of blistering drought. The hilltop citadel of Langres felt like an important milestone. On my rest day I began to walk around the 4km ramparts, but my body refused to comply, in the contradictory way that a pilgrim's body can walk for hours one day and not at all on its day off. How French of it! I took a shortcut back to the pilgrim house and went back to bed, exhausted.
In Torcenay (24km) I scrumped some ripe figs and camped by a small lake, the fish jumping at sunset and dawn. In the morning I walked to the boulangerie a kilometre up the road in Chalindrey, and while I sat with a coffee I amused myself with my habit of reading Google reviews of the establishment. I always learn a juicy new French word or turn of phrase but I do it mostly for the laugh.
“But for a smile or a friendly word from the owner, one might return”, said one, plaintively. I suspected that this person was not getting enough cuddles at home.
The next one sniped: “The card payment system is execrable. The décor is quite nice, but not edible.”
“Pascal and Nathalie are angels!”, gushed another. “We will never change our shopping habits. Respect!”
My coffee and baguette were pretty good, and I bought a sandwich for lunch. The server and I said hello and thank you to each other. There was both paper and soap in the WC; the décor was unremarkable. I was suffused with neither existential loneliness nor heavenly rapture. At midday I sat on a wall in Grandchamp to eat my jambon and emmental baguette and found a lipstick mark on my hitherto unused napkin, the interstitial lines of someone else's mouthskin clearly delineated. I decided not to write a Google review about it.
In the woods, the Bois de Chalindrey south of Torcenay, a small animal came running slowly up the path towards me. I stood still and watched. There was something kittenish about it. Could it be a lost cat? I was prepared to accept it as my familiar if so; I could use the company. It was closer now, and its wide, bright eyes and rounded ears reminded me of a puppy. Then I saw a long brown tail. It was a pine marten! Pantalaimon! At about 13 human paces away it finally saw me and stopped. We locked eyes for a second. Then it veered off the path to my right. A second Pan followed, coming up the path. It, too, turned into the undergrowth, and I heard them both crashing about noisily on the crunchy leaves. I stood still for some time after they had gone, absorbing this moment of wonder worth not trying to photograph.
Just before my destination I left the Haute-Marne and entered my penultimate French department, Haute-Saône. In Leffond (22km) I found my accommodation, a charming little pilgrim apartment attached to the Mairie. I had walked over a marathon in two days, and I found myself pleasingly unblistered and not particularly weary. As I cracked open a cold Coca Cola the church clock struck three, and the carillon played the first four notes of the serene 'Song of Peace' from Sibelius' Finlandia. Outside my window a soft rain fell on the river Salon.
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(The 'Song of Peace' motif can first be heard by the flute at 6:09 here, but it's worth watching the whole video because there are baby bears and goldeneye chicks and all sorts of wonderful Finnish things.)
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More to read here: Get in the tuktuk, no time to explain
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