First impressions are often wrong.

Day 30 Wednesday 26th May
Bagneres de Luchon - Burgalays 9 miles
After such a good time in Luchon it was hard to leave and my body took
a while to get into it's stride. The day was one of 3 parts really.
The first part along paths through woods halfway up the valley side
was slow and frustrating. There is so much debris on the ground and
huge trees across the paths, progress was really slow. Eventually the
path dropped to valley floor level and became more sensible so my
speed increased. then after crossing the valley and cutting a corner
by doing a bit of road walking it was back to the woods. Where it
wasn't obstructed by debris it was very overgrown with grass and
nettles,along it difficult to see the signs and also painful at times,
not to mention the sticks that set out to attack when given the chance.
The bonus of this last stretch though was seeing a couple of large
deer - possibly Isards. Once again they spotted me first so no photos
I'm afraid.
Then I arrived at the chambres d'hotes - Le Calandariou - ready to
relax. The welcome was warm and after a full tour of the stables
they'd converted to guest accommodation followed by a drink and
introductions to various relatives visiting for a fee days I was left
to relax until dinner. I was expecting a fairly subdued evening with
run of the mill food. I couldn't have been more wrong. Marie-France
had prepared a meal which would have done a good class restaurant
proud. And the verbal ping-pong, jokes etc throughout the meal were
very amusing. Everyone took a lot of trouble to make sure I could
follow and participate. It was a riot. The evening flashed by and I
crashed out instantly afterwards.