Atmospheric today!

We had a carb-fuelled breakfast of some kind of deep-fried dough, cold coffee and white bread and honey plus a bit of feta and fig jam. (That sat well on top of last night’s supper of potato and carrot soup, roast potatoes and fried dough twist which allegedly had some cheese interspersed in the mixture. There was tomato and cucumber salad and cinnamon and banana cake for pudding. Anyone on the Zoe diet would not survive). We had to make a picnic lunch from a huge bread roll, feta, tomato, cucumber and sausage (for some) plus an apple.

It had rained heavily during the night and the wispy clouds floated atmospherically around the jagged peaks. Setting off at 9, we walked a short way down the road then turned off to stumble across the rubble-strewn stoney dried up riverbed which formed most of the valley floor. Once on the other side we headed steeply up a tree-lined vehicle track, zig-zagging ever upwards for about an hour till we reached the shepherd’s hut where we were told we could get mountain tea or coke to supplement the income of the poor family. Judging by the new buildings and big 4x4 the shepherd’s 9 children were helping out with the finances. We did not meet the family but Tedi said the UK reg vehicle we met on our way up belonged to one of the sons who now lives and works there.

Tedi said the walk ended there but if we wanted he would take us further and we had a delightful walk up through alpine pastures. Martin and Aline signed a waiver and, being experienced walkers with maps, continued on. We all ambled back, stopping for the drink, wearing sleeves and coats, at the shepherd’s place but soon the cold wind prompted us to hurry on down.

There’s a bug going round the group. 84 year old Robert said on day 2 he had a chest infection and a few days later Polly, the shrill travel agent succumbed to a sore throat and cold so didn’t come out one day. She thoughtfully wore a mask on the minibus. Now she’s lost her voice (which is a blessing for the rest of us). Then the horticulturalists Bob and Jill came down with colds, saying at first it was hay fever, but yesterday wore masks. Marilyn has really suffered with feeling ill for a few days and said to me yesterday her legs were wobbly. Today Janet, her friend, said she wasn’t wanting to miss the walk and hoped it would “blow the cobwebs away”. I expect we’ll all get it.

The news from home is Thomas said his Maths SATs paper was horrendous. Such a shame as he is in the top set and usually has no problem with Maths. On the other hand he didn’t bother doing any practice papers at home. So maybe he’ll start making more effort.