Day 35: Wild Camp on Tuc d'Eychelle before Col de la Core to Seix

My wild camp terrace provided perfect viewing for the magnificent sunrise that greeted me this morning upon unzipping the tent. It had been a cold night, but I was aware that the sun was imminent so I was already warming up!

The quickly changing light and colours were amazing to watch.

The sun soon appeared right over Col de la Core (1395m) which was not far into today's route.

It truly was a great way to wake up.

With beautiful views and colours all around me.

After the early morning sunrise show was over all that was left was to pack up and get going towards my two night break in Seix. I had been conscious there might've been another camper a bit further up from me last night and I was right as an oldish guy appeared at the switchback near my spot.

We exchanged cordial greetings and I immediately recognised he was speaking Spanish, so I used a bit of my basic Spanish - 'ola'! In hindsight, this turned out to be a mistake!

I kid you not - for the next 30 minutes I was spoken to by this fella, no conversation, just spoken to. I must've understood 30 seconds of the speaking to - for the rest of the time I just combined nodding, shaking my head, smiling and saying 'Si' or 'No' whenever I thought it was appropriate!

 I couldn't believe it, when will this torture end I thought?! It was funny at first but it's just painful now I thought as I inserted a smile where I thought appropriate! Why am I facilitating this I thought as I added a 'Si' where I thought appropriate! Then, as quickly as he started talking, he just finished and walked off! I had absolutely no idea what we'd just talked about for half an hour!

I sat and chilled out at Col de la Core for a bit after the path descended through forest from where I'd camped. I watched with amusement as day trippers to the Col battled with an army of trucks resurfacing the road! Apart from that the Col was nothing to shout about.

After my amusement waned I continued on the descent towards Esbintz. As if sunrise wasn't sufficient this morning, the clouds decided to join in the show!

It became difficult not to look up!

What started with an initial wow, turned into a fascination as to why and how cloud like this formed?!

I'm afraid my private school education couldn't answer this, much to my frustration!

I settled for just admiring the beauty of it!

It provided for a nice approach to Esbintz. I passed the Cabane de Tariole (1179m) and soon wound my way to Esbintz (850m). Esbintz was just a farm really, with a Gîtes d'étape.

After Esbintz I soon veered off on the D704 road towards Seix. I was keen to get to the campsite to get washed both in body and clothes! The only thing of note to happen on the gently descending road was the bin where I thought I'd get rid of my rubbish bag. There was a feisty smell around the large bin, I assumed it hadn't been washed out for a while! Oh, how wrong I was! On opening the bin I was greeted with the most vile smell and an army of maggots! I nearly vomited when I caught sight of the dead sheep in the bin! I couldn't believe it, and it took some effort not to bring up my small breakfast!