Building walls ....

Trump is clearly not the first autocratic man to want to build a wall to protect his sand pit. China's Emperor Qin had a good crack at it. Berlin and Belfast's walls were not so visible from space but created their fair share of suffering. And in Britain ... Hadrian built 73 miles of symbolic power to delimit Empire from Barbarian (and judging by current politics I'm sure there's a few Scots who wished the wall was now a bit higher). With Hadrian's Wall came all the ingenuity that the Roman military industrial complex had to offer, including early renditions of blast barriers embedded in fort entrances to stop low wheeled enemy chariots rushing the gates.

Populating the forts along the course of the wall were some of the 56,000 soldiers in England at a time when the population as a whole was only four to five million. Troops came from Spain, Syria, Germany, North Africa with some attempting to serve out the 25 years it took to get Roman citizenship. Some stayed in the North, marrying into local communities and messing with the BNPs claim for some ancient, pure Britishness.

But not only did the Romans mix up the gene pool. According to our guide Colin, at Chester's Museum, Northumbria, they also bequested bits of the English language: 'fort' night (the amount of time you spent in the fort before returning to the main Roman camp); decimation (where every tenth man in a cohort was executed by his fellow soldiers when the cohort had done something naughty, like mutiny); 'you scratch my back' (after the need to get someone to scrape down your back to clean it in the communal baths); 'wrong end of the stick' (from the sticks with sponges on them used in the loo, and with the spongy bit obviously the wrong end you didn't want to get hold of).

The locals living around the excavated remnants have made an art of naming things after the wall: Hadrian's Haulage; Ale Ceasar; Hadrian Hotel etc. If Trump ever does get his border wall in the ground, I shudder to think that one day in the future, after it has crumbled like all walls and all empires governed by narcissists that think they will live forever, it will be excavated and put on show for tourists with a little gift shop nearby selling Trump lager, Trump chutney, and Trump fudge. As his wall is broken up and used in someone else's fence or road or sand pit, he will be reduced to a benign face on a tea towel.

Perhaps then, in the case of Trump's America, it is better to think of his wall as necessary for keeping his Barbarians in so they do as little damage as possible to the rest of the world.

Adventures of an anorak ....

My metamorphosis into an anorak continues ... took the long way to Shimla just so I could spend 5.5 hours on The Himalayan Queen, a narrow gauge railway covering 96km, 102 tunnels, 988 bridges including multi-storey viaducts, and 917 curves up to 48 degrees. Reaching 2075m, with gradients of 1 in 25, it was completed in 1903. Unfortunately the government is now building a new road below it, creating swathes of eroded mountain sides slipping away into the valley below, threatening to take houses, other roads and the rail line with it. The current solution is to spray patches of bare rock with concrete, and to position men with bags of tools at strategic points to patch things up along the way.

 

Two hours of sitting still ....

I know it's a cliche of my impeding age as I morph into a grumpy old woman, but it seems to be becoming increasingly difficult to get anyone to stay still for longer than it takes to check a twitter feed. My local cinema can’t run a 90 minute film anymore without at least three people having to go out to pee or get another drink. In a recent trip to the theatre, another 90 minutes without interval, it was all rustle and cough rather than rapt attention as I suspect Avengers fans had come in to watch Pinter’s Betrayal with Tom Hiddleston and were waiting for a fight to break out.

At a Sadlers Wells gig, featuring a no-interval, two hour solo performance of the full Bach cello suite accompanied by contemporary dance, the crowd was on its best behaviour to begin with, sitting up straight in perfect silence. But then edges started to fray somewhere around the half way point as backs collapsed and bodies leant forward blocking the view of people behind (the choreographer seemingly not taking into account the angle of the bleachers and sent her dancers too often too close to the front of stage so no-one in the circles other than the first row could see anything). Tersely whispered ‘please sit back’ started to reverb around the theatre, along with guilty explanations beginning with ‘but the person in front ...’. As the performance continued with the inclusion of sticky tape pentagrams on the floor, silent pauses, back projected shadows (which were pretty cool), ever more skipping and repeatedly throwing themselves on the ground, little plumes of light started flicking on around the dark as smart phones revealed just how much longer we had left.

Suck it up people! If it's art, suffer for it. If it's the Avengers: Endgame, sit still and pay attention to the pretty colours. Despite some warping ideas from quantum physics, time really will go no faster by checking your phone or fidgeting.

Le tren de ski

As evidence of the civility that comes with train travel I give you London to Schladming via Vienna:


1. Leave London on Eurostar early afternoon (unsurprisingly, generally the most expensive part of any European rail journey given the current British relationship with privatisation) to arrive in Paris for a leisurely early dinner. The city has conveniently arranged clusters of regional cuisine to match the train network hubs. So, Gare de l'Est means massive plates of proper things Lorraine, including sauerkraut and every edible part of a pig.





2. Catch the 19.06 Deutsche Bahn ICE to Frankfurt Flughafen with just one change at Mannheim in the middle: enjoy your comfortable, roomy seats, wifi that actually works and coffee that comes to your table.







3. Transfer to the joy of my life: the 23.54 OBB Night Jet to Vienna. OBB have hoovered up several of the night routes shortsightedly abandoned by DB in hindsight, as there appears a resurgent campaign across Europe to reinstate the night trains. €79 includes water, fresh linen, two excitable German travelling companions and the privilege of rocking to sleep as the train crosses the Alps (even cheaper if you can handle a six person berth but the luxury single occupancy is also there if you want it).










4. Wake up in Vienna at 08.27 (or a few minutes thereafter) having had fresh rolls and tea brought to your bunk as part of your €79.






5. Spend four hours in Vienna, embarrassing your Viennese friends by doing things like going to the Spanish riding school to see the Lippizaners because you've wanted to do that since you were a horse-mad kid; and eating in Cafe Central because Freud and Trotsky (and Hitler, which they don't mention in the publicity), and all the other tourists in Vienna did.

6. Jump on the 14.25 to Schladming with one quick change across the platform at Leoben. Most of OBB's trains plough through the Alps so there are spectacular views and big windows through which to see it.

And then, one stop before Schladming, with some of the worst blizzards the country had seen in decades, the local trains ground to a halt. But please note, British Rail Providers, it is when we have seen several metres of snow in such a short space of time that your snow ploughs can't keep the regional tracks clear, then, and only then, can you cancel a train and bring in the buses.

However, in fairness I have to confess that the return journey was less civilised, involving the continuation of the rail replacement bus service after a week of blizzards, now significantly overcrowded as they had to get not only increasing numbers of passengers in but our suitcases, skis and ski boots as well, followed by having to change buses 30 miles before Salzburg, then getting on a local train that was all stops, leading to the missing of subsequent connections back to London and the final resort of a flight home. We're still fighting with OBB, Trainline and God over who has responsibility.

Finishing Things

After 53 days over four years, 892km, 50,700 metres of ascent and 49,700 metres of descent, 100s of insect bites, several blisters, one pair of boots, a torch and a couple of t-shirts, I finally made Banyuls-sur-Mer, the end point of the GR10.

It had been a steep tumble down, one last cruel kick up on stony path, passing the fresh faces and good looking white clothes of those just starting out in Ibiza hats and impractical plimsolls, and then a final plunge into vineyards and olive groves. It would be pleasant on a cool day but the heat was scorching and the rubber of my soles felt increasingly bendy on melting tar. The trail eventually became a street and then a town that I’d been to before but didn’t remember in its current arrangement.

You think there would be some fanfare, particularly having belted out the last three hours without a stop in the full heat of afternoon, but the rest of Banyuls was heading to the beach, to a café, to the shops, completely uninterested in the sweaty remains of yet another hiker standing in front of the commemorative plaque on the wall of the Mairie. I took a selfie of my pack and headed for shade, a litre of red cordial on ice, another litre of water, a cup of Darjeeling, and later, a litre of coconut juice.

The heat made memories of this final stage an improbable smudge of hours into days, with only dust and cicadas threading time into a semblance of coherence as the trail rolled downwards to the sea. I tried to rank ‘the best of the GR10’, with the section from Plateau de Beille to Pic du Canigou as the possible winner with its deep valleys, rivers, peaks, and impromptu mountain lake picnic spots. But memories of Val de l’Aspe and l’Haute Pyrénées disrupt attempts to make hierarchies. So instead I made myself recall aspects of each day out of assemblages of trail, landscape, and body.

The first moments like the last ascend and descend, through forests, occasionally passing through or ending in a village that is dead to the world except for the few who return in the summer gathering respite from the towns. Between rifts, the trail opens up into a wide alpine valley and becomes a series of rural paths and old Roman road. There is a crescendo towards Pic du Canigou and then, en balcon, traversing its side, looking east through layers of blue, the ridges of foothills down to wrinkles and plains and lakes to the sea, the massif at my back receding behind cloud. Distance is interspersed with the need to scan the close at hand, looking to the feet to avoid cow pats, breaks in the trail, shaky rock hopping streams starting out life in narrow ravines. 

The landscape changes into dry, rocky escarpment that smells like home. Roc de France, one of several great granite outcrops, cracked and ready to roll, grandstanding over gnarly old beech lurching in all directions that look like they may come alive à la Lord of the Rings. I can’t get my bearings in the forest. It is soft under foot, padding accumulated over years of leaf fall, and dense canopy traps the heat so that despite the shade I drip sweat.

From Col de la Cirère, a partition is rent and heat radiates upwards and outwards, reverberating off stone. The trees become eucalypts but not quite, and the undergrowth becomes scrub smelling of sage. Farmhouses (mas), red tile roofs with Spanish outlooks, are tucked into corners with handy source pipes for impromptu showers. Archaeological sites promise that Hannibal has been this way. For a second, there is a motorway but also a cold Agrum from the first kiosk I see, downed in 30 seconds. It hits 41 degrees in the hell that is Col du Perthus and close to Col de l’Ouillat an entire family has conked out under some scraps of shade.

The final Col is a ‘drive to’ tourist destination, settled into forest; a place of giant pines quietly screening out the heat, overseeing BBQs and dog walking, camping and wild cows. The hum of cicadas heralds the arrival of fellow walkers: dripping Germans, French and the English Prof (long pickled in alcohol and nicotine but completing the Haute Route Pyrénées, so, respect).

The path weaves in and out of arbitrary frontiers; the border fence a sparse bit of barbed wire keeping out immigrant cows. Accents become less French and the yellow and red of Catalan is everywhere. There is fervent discussion at the table, and narratives of history recalled, handed down each generation over centuries to dig deeper the furrows of a dispute that is not going away any time soon. Other comings and goings overlay such conflicts. Passing time before dinner at Las Illas, I idle slowly around the village tracing Les Évadés: those fleeing Vichy France (including Jews, British pilots, and Walter Benjamin at some point); and coming the other way, those escaping Franco. The transnational also find their way here; the pied à terre expats, the hippies, the retirees.

The trail assembles such bodies, in passing, at a table or on a col, spaced out but connected in some way. A sense of stillness descends in rest, defining equanimity in the contemplation of cowbells and the sounds of a river, eating picnics and finally considering descent towards the valleys enfolding more and more people along the way, found tucked into nooks and crannies, creased into picnic spots among the rocks and the trees and the bushes, sitting by the side of the path in the middle of a forest, regarding life, circumnavigating mirror lakes to be disgorged at assorted hostels, gîtes and hotels.

I note the trail makes hard bodies, as I randomly pass the fit and naked, lying stoned on the rocks of a riverbed. I share a bunk with M&M, both in their 70s and both mountain walking for over 30 years with the wiry musculature of the much younger, such as the two Spanish runners I redirect through a forest; straight out of Vogue with nothing more on than black sports bra, shorts and wash board stomachs.

The motley crew gets motlier as we plunge down the final spurs and foothills to the sea, with each new batch requiring analysis. At the intersection of walkers and anoraks, a man at the opposite table is reading a book on European butterflies. I’ve seen some brilliant species today. There are three teenagers with springy ligaments and knee joints, one of whom carries an open umbrella for shade. There are the three young men, and Jackson the dog, sensibly avoiding a career by staying as long as possible in the mountains. A young woman all lean body and tattoos started out with a 22kg pack but is sensibly leaving some with an understanding gîte owner to pick up by car on her way back. There’s a young north American woman who really needed to speak English, had bed bugs, was abandoned by her friend when she realised what the Pyrénées entailed, and who hadn’t booked any accommodation. She was adopted by the Germans. There is Sam, who spends the afternoon drinking beer, then a jug or so of wine, then after dinner liqueur. I find him howling outside my very basic gîte, and being yelled at in turn by the locals, and get him inside where he collapses on a mattress downstairs. He wakes several times during the night to cough up a lung but spryly passes me the next day. Bastard. I analyse myself.

People come and go, and sometimes disappear. The gendamerie pull me over in Siguer and ask if I’ve seen a man gone missing. I had passed one going the other direction but too young I think for the one they’re looking for. My bad French may also have sent them in the wrong direction: le col and Lercoul being very similar when I say them.

I remember the wild things: the black horses of Plateau de Beille that investigate my yurt; fields of yellow and purple wildflowers; marmots setting off their high pitched alarm as wild cats stalk them over moraine. There is also the forest where the wild people live: in a clearing with pirate vans, tipi and horse. Little trails disappear into the shadows and the outlines of off grid shanties.

I remember wild weather. In the afternoon a storm would mostly threaten, with thunder barely raising itself into a clap and either deciding it can’t be arsed, passing over to somewhere else, or half hearted drizzle will accompany sleep until a clear morning repeats itself. But occasionally the clouds gather up their contempt into fat cumulonimbus and bring down hell on a hot earth, grumbling and cracking for hours. Half way to Porteille des Besines (2333m), it begins with a bank of black cloud speeding up the valley, swallowing me in its biblically dark path, and slapping wind and rain into the mountain. It ends after an hour just as abruptly, by passing through a curtain into a sprawling valley below. There must always be a willingness to be immersed in these elements, to be blown over by their great gusts, but just make sure to be swaddled in gortex while its happening.

After the outburst there is refuge: coffee, crepes, nutella, warmth. There is a feeling of gratitude to arrive at shelter, to sit on a wooden deck overlooking a river, as the storm growls its way down the valley, distant thunder echoed, replied to by an outstretched arm of black cloud. Ecogite Orrie de Planés is all brick and children, scoring slightly higher than the gîtes of Rouze and Esbints due to its immaculate sleeping quarters and Pink Floyd playing across the terrace in front of the pool. In the dining hall there are pictures of all the produce providers on the wall; the guardian points out whose veggies and cows we are eating.

Refuge Ras de la Carança is compact, with no showers except the icy blast of the rig next to the creek. The superbly clean composting toilet is 100m away. There are two roaming chickens and a dog that likes stick-throw and my yarn. Quietness descends with cards and scrabble, books and kindles. Py is a patchwork of medieval stonework, and 20th century cement and drains, ancient cemeteries and today’s artisanal beer. At Hotel Glycine, Arles sur Tech, I recharge myself and my gadgets, and plan to lie in on clean sheets, but the church bells peal ALL night, on the hour, outside my window opened to escape the heat on the top floor where the walkers are deposited so our smelly bags and bodies don’t offend anyone (though in fairness the hotel is very welcoming and the food is excellent, served in a courtyard under an ancient mass of ivy).


There is always the uncomfortable; the little scramble to Lescun paling into insignificance compared to Pic du Canigou’s chimnée; and that moment when I proclaim in bad French ‘Pour l’environnment, les Française doit arrêter manger le viande’, just as the rest of the table goes quiet and all French eyes turn to me. But most discomfort can be resolved by perspective. There are things over which I have no control; there are things I can get better at if I choose to practice (please, practice my French!); and the most difficult path does not have to be taken. I do not have to walk up an inclined ice pack and then leap from a hollowed out ledge onto the moraine at its edges. It may just be indicative of trust issues with my boots but I can always choose to scramble around the outside to get to where I need to be. 

Notes to self for the New Year 2019

Always remember that miracles can happen ....
It‘s 1.30am NYE, and tens of thousands of people are trying to get home on a sporadic night bus service. But lo ... what is this I see coming towards me down the street ... Yes! A taxi with its light on. Now it’s a whole block away so I think there’s no way it’s going to reach us before one of the throng of thousands hails it down first. But it gets closer and closer and I start to edge inconspicuously up the street past the bus queue trying not to draw any attention to it as my heart starts to beat faster at the possibility of a ride home (or from the several cups of coffee I now need to stay up past midnight) until, with just 20 metres or so to go, I unleash the inner seagull (that taxi/chip is mine, mine, mine) and sprint, throwing myself in front, and while the cabbie jams on the brakes, grab the door handle (rules of London cabs - they who hold the door handle own the cab) and throw myself and the Navigator inside. We are not allowed to spend any money for the rest of the month in order to recoup the cost but it was worth every penny. 

With such a good start to the year, what could possibly go wrong ....

The fallibility of using the past for future navigational choices ...

It’s an illusion of age that things from the past are imagined in increased proportions; like going back to your primary school and realising how small it actually is when your memory is of a really big place. On the other hand, when it comes to mountains, it seems to be inverse proportions that remain, as my memories of Pic du Canigou (2,784m) was of a much smaller ascent than it actually turned out to be when facing it again ten years later. Admittedly, on my first encounter I was going down with just a small day bag. My recollections may also have been influenced by the guide books that all described it as an ‘easy’ ascent (although perhaps not in bad weather), and the occasional gîte/refuge guardian who may have climbed it once or twice, reassuring me it was ‘trés facile’.

I was still in two minds when I reached a crossroads and was faced with the choice of the shorter, steeper, Le Chimnée, or the longer official GR10 route. I stood there for 10 minutes debating with myself which way to go as cloud descended and it looked like rain, but just as I was about to continue ahead, Mimi and Michel, two lovely French hikers in their 70s I’d been tagging along the trail from Goulier, caught up with me and turned right. I followed, thinking something like, 'I once got down it, and Mimi and Michel are like ... 70 ... so how hard can going up be'. 

We emerged above the cloud and continued up the valley towards steep, long lacets of moraine and rocky passage. Leaving Mimi and Michel trailing, 1000m dissolved into a couple of hours and I was at the base of 200ft of near vertical rock face.

In hindsight, I should have relied on Google rather than my memory as Le Chimnée is in fact a Grade 2 scramble, defined by the British Mountaineering Council as a point where the line between scrambling and rock climbing becomes ‘blurred, and the use of protection becomes more advisable’. Grade 2 scrambles usually include sections where a rope is a good idea if you’re not feeling too confident. I had no rope, and my confidence had ebbed away with age, particularly following the Italian misadventure. The foul vegetarian dinner that I’d paid a supplement of €3 for the night before had already violently exited and my stomach was gurgling. My period started. I needed to pee. I was carrying a full pack that restricted movement. But faced with no choice, I was going up. 

It helped that it was a weekend and there were numerous agile runners (yes, people run up and over Pic du Canigou for fun), and other hikers clambering around me to provide encouragement. So it was little ledge to little ledge, tiny foothold to tiny handhold, metre by metre apart, steeper and steeper, for I do not know how long (time, like memories of height, was getting out of proportion), until the last three metres of straight up.

Knackered and at the very edge of my comfort zone, I perched on a jutting rock, letting some runners descend, before the last narrow passage to the top where a group of Catalans waited for me to clear the chute and generally cheer me on. One last haul and I was by the cross marking the point that I recalled from years ago, bearing the flags and hopes of Catalans that their country will one day be independent of Spain. 

A definitive edge remained in focus but beyond that clouds rose and fell, along with the chatter of day trippers. The sun and blue sky, the outlines of valleys and crests, appeared and vanished. A step further, the abyss. I could see the sea again knowing it was only five days until I would put my toes in it. 

Slow and steady, first Michel and then Mimi, half my size with twice my pack making me feel like a complete sook, appeared over the threshold and joined me for sandwiches. Quietness descended, with a slightly disturbing thought murmuring in the back reaches of my mind: ‘how the feck did I get down it the first time!'