11th September 2023

Rain at some time before 7am. I was forced outside to ensure the induction hob was not getting wet. Of course the rain immediately stopped. 

I set out for a walk over 3 volcanoes. They were Puy de la Rodde,  Puy de Charmont, and Puy de Vichatel.  Unfortunately I seem to have lost the track for the first volcanoe, and only have the track from the top of Puy de Charmont.  Odd because I was using the app in tracking mode to see where I was going. Somehow I deleted it, or it was not saved.  The first hill, there was no official route to the actual top. Easy long walk, then some off-piste walking to get to the top. A tree! Going back easy paths in the main.

On to the next peak, I had to walk through a local village, a short interaction with villagers and their dogs, cut short with my “Je ne parle pas le Francais”.

Followed the the path to the next volcano. This one seemed a straight up and down. The peak on the map does not coincide with the actual height point where there was a desolate pile of stones.

Then down a steep gradient, blocked by a felled tree. Walked across a road, and then a gradient up to a third peak. This was a gentler walk up.

I saw nobody on this walk so far other than the two women and their dogs.  Nobody else.

There was now a ground level walk back, during this I saw another 4 people on paths nearby, a cyclist coming from the opposite direction, and a rucksack carrying woman heading in my direction

It was about 12-14 km for the walk. Somehow, I lost part of the track on the phone, so I can’t be entirely sure.

Shower today, my feet well beat up and dirty.

Supper was puy lentils, sausages, onions, red pepper. Another one pot excellent meal on the induction hob.

A Belgian VW T25 parked next to us. From the 80s which has been in the family for 25 years.

The French girls were very much quieter tonight, or we dropped off from tiredness.

All washing up completed as we are moving on tomorrow.

9th September 2023

We upped sticks today, packing away. Our Scottish friends were on their way also. Amazing how wet the underside of the groundsheet was, this despite the heat and lack of rain. It had rained a few days before we arrived.

We decided to use the toll road but headed first to the Intermarché HYPER at Montpon Menesterol to buy diesel and groceries. It looked like a big supermarket, but actually was quite small with a rather poor selection of beers and food. But we managed to load up with several days of food and drink, and made our way to the motorway, heading for the volcanoes.

The trip was fast, although we did stop for a picnic lunch. The service station was so full, we parked on the grass. Nice to see so many electric vehicle chargers. Some though were being used for parking by ICE cars and not for charging . I suspect the occupants were lazy and wanted the shelter of the canopies. I refer to this situation as the chargers were ICED.

There were a number of wildlife bridges crossing the Motorway, they were significantly wider than a road bridge, and arched. The trees and bushes growing on the bridges looked very well developed. Some of the bridges were wooden clad with reliefs of animals.

We arrived at the camp site Camping Volcanoes in the small village of La Garandie, near Aydat and Lac d’Aydat We were expecting great things, this site was a ‘Nature Site’ with composting food waste. It was rather short of electricity points, and some were miles away. We were setting up and suddenly realized we could not connect to the power, we were too far away, so we moved to another spare pitch. We watched the same situation unfurl with other campers. The next arrival to us found his cable could not reach, he was replaced by another van with a longer cable. Another van arrived and found that there were only 3 sockets.

Now we see why this site is not an ACSI site, it was expensive, had no loo paper (getting more common again in France) and no guarantee for an electric hookup. This was a pretty poor show. We are booked here for three nights. I don’t want to drive out for the day in the van, someone would probably nick our electric connection.

The campsite had quite a few hikers and cyclists staying in small huts or tents. We saw an elderly couple leave the next morning with their rucksacks. The campsite has one of the GR walking routes running right by it.

On the way to the campsite, we went on to Aydat. The small town was heaving with people. Being a warm, sunny Saturday had brought out thousands of French, presumably from Clermont-Ferrand.

Like so many campsites, there is too much artificial light, and you have to move outside the site for some darkness. Then you are blinded by the gateway motion sensitive arc light as you leave and enter. Still, I believe I saw the milky way.

France - La Garandie

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