Thursday 18 September 2008

13/09/08 - A great valley shared by two countries.

A beautiful sunny Saturday meant our carpark quickly filled up with
the day's tourists. Our plan though was to head down and back up the
other side of the valley to the village of Serrat, as Marea's eagle
eyes had spotted a poster advertising a festival there this weekend.
Unfortunately, on arrival we found that this mountain pueblo very very
quiet, with only a hint that bigger things could be taking place later
on.

So, for us, it was a case of taking in the fabulous view, then on the
road headed towards the border town of Puigcerdá. Our climb up to La
Collada De Toses (1,800m) was doubly exciting as Ange S's texts kept
us informed of the All Blacks v Wallabies score. Then after a lazy
lunch at the top, it was down to 'The Great Valley of the Pyrenees'.

I'm not sure if its just me, but when you look at the map and the town
of Puigcerdá sitting right on the border with France - I got the idea
that this was a town sitting at the top of the mountains - cause isn't
that where you would stick a border?? But no, sitting right in the
middle of this section of Pyrenees is this big huge valley that Spain
and France share.

Armed with lots of possibilities of walks around the area, we headed
to the French end of the valley where one of the walks started - that
by the description sounded like a good sleeping spot. A late birthday
phone call to Father Smith, then lots and lots of blankets cause it
definitely feels like summer is over in these hills!!

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