Deadly storm vs hungry pilgrims

The storm turned out to be a deadly storm for the south west region of France. 2 people were killed. Headlines news across the country reports major damage to the Lot and Gers regions, exactly where we were walking.

We rested and we needed to go into the village to look for some food for dinner. We walked slowly into the village, our feet were in pain from a long day’s walk. We went pass the big church, and headed on to the Main Street of Lalbenque. La rue du marche aux truffles, the street is empty, no gathering of truffles stalls of course, we were too early for truffles season yet in Lalbenque. Truffles season does not start until December.

At the first restaurant we got to, there were a large sign on the door “closed because of storm”. Ah sigh … We were hungry! We walked on some more and got to another restaurant. Door closed. Sign said “closure exceptional, due to no power”. We wandered around the village and got to two more restaurants. No signs but all doors were closed shut and locked down.

The grocery store was also closed. The village was quiet, not a soul in the street. The aftermath of the big storm can really be felt today.

We were suddenly really really hungry. May be tonight will be the first night we go to bed hungry? There is always a first. We backtracked and walked pass the big church to go back to the gite for tonight. As we made our way back, the air started to fill up with a smell of something very good. When you are hungry, you can smell food from a mile a way. We looked at each other, may be a restaurant is open?

We followed the smell of something good, garlic, thyme, herbs? As we walked on, we started to hear people talking. Yes, a restaurant for sure. We did not really see any sign, just more and louder talking. It’s sounds like a party, a large group of people, lots of noise, loud talking and soft talking, men voices and women voices. We approached a house, a window was open right at our waist high. We looked inside, it’s a kitchen. To our surprise, there was not really a party, not a large group of people, there was just an old man and a woman. Only two of them and such a raucous! The man was sitting on a chair at the table. The woman standing, looking, talking, going back and forth between the sink and the table. Yelling sometime, talking non stop. The man sitting on the chair is equally loud and talking and yelling back with one hand over his left eye. Just the two of them and it was quite a scene. We stood at the window smelling the wonderful smell of something cooking in the oven, watching the fight at the table, wondering if a person can get full by just breathing the smell of food?

Actually it’s the other way around, we got hungrier as we breathed more of the wonderful smell. It’s hard to walk away. The woman looked at the window and saw us. We smiled at her. We asked her if everything is ok? Actually she should be asking us if everything is ok with us as I am sure our faces are showing signs that we were both going to faint very soon if we don’t get any food soon.

She said “my husband was working in the garden cleaning up the mess from the storm when he got something in his eye. Now he’s saying it’s hurting him, he can’t see, he’s going blind from it, I am trying to clean his eye or I will have to take him to the hospital!”

Ed said “I am an eye doctor, let me look!”

The woman made the sign of the cross and looked up at the sky “oh mon dieu! Merci “. (Oh my god, thank you).

She opened the door for us. Ed came to the kitchen table. He looked at the man, took the man’s hand out of his face, while the woman explained to him a doctor is here to look at his eye.

Ed pulled down the lower eye lid with one hand, look closely inside the eye. He then pulled up the upper eye lid. The poor man’s eye was now all red from all his rubbing. Suddenly Ed says “ah hah, I see it”. He leaned in, then he tilted the man’s head upward to the ceiling. With the left hand Ed opened the upper lid, and with the right hand Ed pulled out a small thorn like twig from his eye.

The old man was clearly relieved. He thanked Ed profusely. We all laughed and Ed gave him a good pat on his shoulder. “Ca va bien” Ed said. “Ca va bien, merci” the man replied.

Well, time to leave now. Ed smiled and rubbed his stomach “j’ai un petit creux”. The man says “un petit creux?”. It’s the French way to say “I have a little hole in my stomach, meaning my stomach is empty, in other words, I am hungry.” We explained we were walking into the village but everything was closed due to the storm.

The old couple insisted we must stay and share their dinner. I did not think they needed to do a lot of insisting. We sat down. Chicken baked in a mushroom sauce. Ratatouille with eggplant, zucchini and tomatoes. Bread. Red wine. We dined in style. There were enough food for four. And dinner was delicious. Hunger is the best sauce.

The old man told us his life story on his truffles farm. He has 15 acres of truffles oak trees. I was so surprised to learn truffles are no longer an affair of wild truffles in the forest where the trained dogs or pigs are used to go smell them out and the truffles collectors would dig them up. The truffles are now mostly cultivated in the farms, they grow on the roots of oak trees, so truffles farms are actually groves of truffles oak trees. The truffles are started in April and they can be harvested starting in December. Truffles are so expensive these days. This region is known for the black truffles, dubbed black diamonds.

The most truffles are consumed in France during Christmas. Christmas in France is like Thanks giving in the U.S. The French goes all out with their feasting. We have turkey, stuffing and pumpkin pie. The French at Christmas has turkey, truffles stuffing, foie gras and marrons glacees ( candied chestnuts).

A kilogram of truffles these days cost $2500 euros! In Italy, there is a white truffles that cost $10,000 euros! In 2010, a billionaire in Macao paid $330,000 for 1.3 kilogram of truffles at an auction.

The truffles production in France has gone down dramatically due to weather pattern changes, summer is too hot and that’s bad for the truffles. Production used to be 1000 ton a year and now down to 50 tons a year and with the shrinking truffles production, truffles prices has skyrocketed!

We learned so much about truffles. And we no longer have “un petit creux” in our stomach. We thank our hosts and we told them we will be back to visit them one day during truffles season. He said yes he will put Ed to work going digging for truffles!!!

The night back at the gite went on without any surprises. No more storms tonight.

We woke up the next morning to a chilling 52 degrees! What a sudden change in temperature! It was a heat wave 3 days ago?

My weather channel shows a dry day today. Dry and cold. A hiker’s dream walking weather!

It was indeed a very pleasant walk. At about 8 km into Cahors, we started the descent into town. A tough and rocky descent.

When we cross the old bridge into town, we stopped by to have our pilgrim passport stamped at a little pilgrim accueil stand. The old lady working there told us she greets about 8000 pilgrims a year that stop by Cahors. For this year, we are the first Americans!

We got to our place to rest for the night.

Cahors is a beautiful town with the church st Etienne anchoring in the middle of its old town.

The whole town is actually surrounded by the river Lot.

Today’s exciting news all over France is the arrival of thousands of tractors into Paris. The farmers are demanding recognition for their hard work and are asking for help from the government for their hard work. They are driving their tractors to the main square in Paris to raise awareness for the demand to be heard. It’s quite a scene to see all the farmers driving in their tractors at 15 km an hours coming from all over the country.

Ed says he supports the farmers. He wishes he could be near Paris to get a ride on one of those French tractors for a ride into the French capital.

We expect to have a nice good dinner tonight and get a good rest here in Cahors tonight.