After a relaxed and protein breakfast, unlike the usual bread and confiture, we hopped aboard the delivery truck and headed for Conques which was about 21 kilometres away - a short trek by car but a full day walk for us. We and our packs were dropped in the middle of a beautiful medieval city which was dominated by a huge church. The area surrounding the church was very charming and touristy. The streets were cobblestones and not easy to walk on and there were a fair number of French tourists enjoying the same things we were. We went into a very cramped restaurant and had some lunch and walked around for a bit.
For a variety of reasons we decided to walk on a bit further and went another 9km to Noalinhac. Had we known what that part of the trail was like we probably wouldn't have chosen to walk at that point, but we didn't so we did. We walked up, up and up a rocky path which had a lot of fairly steep drop-offs on one side. This is the kind of thing that I don't really notice as long as it seems safe - which it was - but anyone with vertigo may find difficult. It was a difficult walk and the 9 kilometers seemed to take a long time for us to walk.
Once we arrived at Noalinhac we had to walk down into the town and get the key to the gîte and then walk back up a hill about 500 metres to the gîte where we were alone all night with no heat but great showers. There was a fireplace which we lit but there was not much wood and the fireplace didn't give any heat anyway. Nevertheless it was pleasant to be alone and our night went peacefully. We ate ham and cheese and tomato sandwiches for dinner and had bowls of warm tea for breakfast. The restaurant had told us they would be open at 7:00 but when we passed by at 7:25 they still weren't open. There went our plans for lunch as well since the little store attached to the restaurant also wasn't open.
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