Tuesday 10 July 2007

Pilgrimage from St Croix to Grancy 04/07/07


After a good night sleep, a big breakfast and a hot shower it was once again time to face the weather.

We were in great spirits as Dan had just found a brochure for the Montreux Jazz Festival and we would be passing through just as it started. The line up is amazing with Chemical Brothers, Beastie Boys, Norah Jones, Prince, and heaps more. The only problem is that it runs over two weeks. Will we be able to drag ourselves away or will we get stuck?

The walk from St Croix down the mountain was absolutely stunning!!! The track took us into a big gorge with high cliffs, waterfalls and forest. The rain stayed away for the first couple of hours but then it was once again pouring.

We have been living pretty cheaply so when we saw a sign for roast beef 16CHF we couldn’t resist. After stripping off our rain gear and finding a table we were very disappointed to find out that the roast beef had run out and they only had chicken!

All ended well though with the meal being superb.

A couple of kms further on we came to a town called “Orny” :) What a perfect place to sit down for a beer and try to chat up the “Orny barmaids”. But it wasn’t to be. There were no bars to be seen and no Orny barmaids :(

The rain was coming in waves and the times it cleared up gave us the most amazing view of the mountains. Switzerland is a gorgeous country.

Coming into Cossonay at around 18:00 we were soaking wet and decided find a hotel for the night. It wasn’t our lucky day as even though the town had a gym, many restaurants and even an English pub there were no hotels. We couldn’t believe it!

All was not lost though. Just across the road was Cossonay’s own “Crazy Bar”. What an appropriate place to go and drown our sorrows with a couple of pints of Guinness.

After talking with the owner about the lack of places to stay in the town she went on to ask some of the other customers where the closest places were. It was looking like we had another 15kms of walking to do but then one of the farmers piped up and said we could sleep in his barn. He lived 4kms away, which meant we had to get a lift with him in his car. I wasn’t going to at first but after looking at our map it would actually take us further away from tomorrows destination so I figured it couldn’t hurt.

Cédric is a champion! An extremely friendly man who when younger drove a car down to the North of Africa and lived there for three years. He couldn’t speak any English so after showing us the barn he left us to make ourselves at home. He even left us a bottle of there family made wine to drink before bed. The kindness of people never ceases to amaze me!

The funniest part of the day came when Cédric’s parents came home and thought they had sprung us hiding out in their barn. Luckily his mother spoke English and after we explained the situation they saw the humor in it.

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