A Brief Fling In France

We had a window of two nights between leaving the UK and being due in Spain to start our El Camino trek. Just time to nip down to the south of France for one full day in Sommières with Mary's cousin Penny and her husband Chris. 

Sommières takes the prize for being the oldest house we've stayed in, the building being around 1000 years old, with the foundations being around 2000 years old.

Basically, the Romans built a bridge over the river somewhere around AD 100, and then over time this was extended, over and over again. In the basement one can still see parts of the original bridge. Unlike excavated ruins, such as in Rome or Pompeii, here the structure has been continously used for all that time. Astonishing. 

Like many other locations in Europe, Sommières is a pretty, fortified market town with an important history, none of which we knew prior to our visit. And it was a nice touch for them to put out bunting to mark the occasion of our visit! 

Not to mention the music festival in the Square outside:

One of the best parts of Sommières has to be the Fort. 

While not as ancient as the bridge, it's history neatly summarised the history of the entire town. There are excellent display panels explaining all the relevant events, the older ones depicted with cartoon illustrations and the later ones with photos. Even cooler was that some events included the Square overlooked by Penny and Chris' apartment. 

Another undoubted highlight was climbing the tower. The spiral staircase is literally not wide enough to permit passing, so helpful instruction panels top and bottom advise visitors to shout before trying to go up or down to ensure no other traffic. Not sure what happens if others in the stairwell don't understand the significance of the shouting!

The views from the top are certainly worth the slightly nervewracking climb... 

The other fascinating aspect to the town is the somewhat regular flooding. 

On the walls at various points are markers showing the height of specific floods. I think there is an obvious observation to make: If the river regularly floods between 1 and 4 metres above the street level AND that street level is itself a couple of metres above normal river level AND this is happening over an area several hundred metres wide AND it sometimes happens more than once in the same year, then that's hardly a rare event. Shouldn't one therefore question the wisdom of having a village on that spot? Perhaps build only on the hills around that flood prone area? 

Clearly villagers over the centuries have thought otherwise, and Sommières carries on delightfully. 

Having had a great break in Sommières, it was time to take our leave. 

Getting to Sommières had been easy: a direct flight from Gatwick to Montpellier, an Uber to the village bus station, then a short walk to our accommodation. Simple, and cheap. 

Getting to Sarria in Spain? Neither easy nor cheap. 

Note first that Sarria is a reasonably sized town, and is a very popular start point for the El Camino. One would therefore expect regular transport options. Indeed, the trusty Rome2Rio app had shown many options, with varying combinations of trains, buses, and planes. 

None of which allowed getting there in one day from where we were in the south of France, and all of which were expensive. 

Some recommended routes required almost 3 days, and the most 'viable' and 'economic' suggested route required us flying back to Gatwick, then flying to Spain, followed by catching multiple buses and trains!

What to do? Simple. Rent a car. It was significantly cheaper to rent a car for 2 weeks,  and to leave it parked for one of those weeks during the walk, rather than any of the other options. Additionally, it was the only option that would get us there in one day, albeit arriving at 11pm.

Moral of the story: wherever one goes one should plan to get out before going in. Or perhaps should that be "Make sure your travel arrangements include an escape plan" ... 

Never mind, it all worked out in the end and at the same time solved the secondary problem of how to get to Paris in order to fly to Vancouver after the walk. 

Next stop: The Way!