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squiz Member Member#: 6644 Location: Registered: 27-05-2007 Diary Entries: 2899 |
21st May 2012 Hiking - Walking: Gorges de la Fou Wind Direction: Wind Stength: Surf / Sea State: Air Temperature: Sea Temperature: Weather: Max Speed: Distance Covered: Monday 21st May 2012 – walking **** still raining :( It was actually clear and we could see right up the valley when we opened the curtains this morning. We were hopeful that it would clear out completely because we could even see the sea in the distance and it must be 40-50 miles away. We decided to give the Gorges de la Fou a try as it seemed a good bet for a dull morning. Have to say they were really good, if a little over-priced at 9.50 Euros each (that’s blown the budget for this week!). The gorge is a very narrow canyon, only 1 metre in some places with a metal walkway up the whole 1500m length. Sometimes the rock comes over the walkway it is so narrow and there are several metal stair cases too. You walk just above the water all the way whether it is gushing down waterfalls, carving out great swirls in the rock or in pools where we saw trout swimming. There are a couple of very small grottes as well with a few stalactites forming. They have gone to a lot of trouble to make it a botanical walk too, placing signs near various ferns and flowers. It took us a good two hours to walk to the end and back. We saw a dipper flying past at our eye level and a poor yellow toad with his pouches inflated desperately trying to swim out of an eddy under a waterfall. We watched him for ages but left before it turned into a sad ending :( We saw several English people there which was surprising because there are hardly any about anywhere down here. Back to the van where it did look like it was brightening up :) Drove through the lovely valley we could see from our over night spot to the village of Le Tech, a really pretty place with a picnic spot on the river of the same name. We stopped here and had eggy bread for lunch :) It started raining again and basically rained for the rest of the day :( We carried on to Prats de Mollo la Preste (which is marked on our map with a ski symbol but don’t see why as there are no peaks that near the town and no signs of skiing anywhere). There was a walled town and a fort on top of the hill but as it was raining we didn’t get out here. Carried on the La Preste part of the town which is a bit further on and is another La Therme but is a lot prettier than the one in Amelie Les Bains as it is an old Victorian era hotel and spa. The National reserve starts at this point so we drove up and explored the roads you could access by vehicle as far as we could go and saw the big snow covered peak really close (albeit between the passing cloud and rain!) and the back end of a deer disappearing into the woods. There are a couple of refuges up here in case you want to take two days to walk to the Pic du Canagou! We found the perfect place to park for the night, one parking place between two waterfalls on the side of a road only used to access the refuge so absolutely nobody here at all. If only the rain would stop it would be such a great place for hiking and just getting out in it. It is spectacularly beautiful with all the water falls, different shades of green in the beech trees, wild flowers everywhere and the mountains too but you just can’t do anything and can only look at it through steamed up windows! It is not even worth taking many photos because they come out so dark and don’t really show what it is like. How depressing :( Some sunshine and no rain tomorrow please!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! |
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