Travelling in the knowledge that you have a point of return gives you the will to keep moving away.
- Raynor Winn, The Salt Path (2018)
A day of rather dull landscapes, but amazing skies! And inhabitants of the skies. All the way along the trail I saw, and heard, unfamiliar birds... and I wasn't even able to use the Merlin app to identify them, as there was no Internet reception for most of the way! I later managed to identify two of them: the common crane (very large, grey like a heron but flies with its neck straight, not bent; sounds like a seagull) and the water rail (I bird I didn't actually see, but heard a lot: it squeals like a pig! Really!!)
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| The Rhône seen from Arles |
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| Wherever I go, I find myself in a Van Gogh painting |
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| Crossing the Rhône |
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| Looking back at Arles over the Rhône |
There are two paths from Arles to Saint-Gilles: the official GR route, corresponding to the first stage of the GR 653 / Voie d'Arles, better known outside France as the Via Tolosana; and an alternative route beside the canal known as the Petite Rhône. Last time I walked this stage, I followed the canal, and it was extremely monotonous, so this time I tried the other route, even though Anne and Marie-Hèlene, two pilgrims I met in Saint-Gilles on that occasion, had told me it was equally boring, and entirely on paved roads.
The road out of Arles on the other side of the bridge, Route du Camargue, was quite busy just after eight in the morning, with people going to work and school, and there was a short stretch with no sidewalks, a ditch on one side and a row of maple trees on the other. Once out of Arles, though, the trail followed small paved roads through the fields and marshes, with very little traffic.
From the rice paddies of Vercelli to the rice paddies of the Camargue - in 40 days! 😅
When I was tired of seeing only fields, and puddles, on either side of the road, I took a little detour into the centre of the village of Saliers and stopped in at the local bistrot/épicerie for a hot chocolate. The joky bartender said that would be €2.80 for the hot chocolate and €50 for the wifi. When another customer came in and the bartender came out with another similar line, the customer turned to me and said, What's wrong with this guy? - He's crazy, I replied, happy to be "in" on a joke in French! 😜
The last few kilometres into Saint-Gilles were fairly non-descript, other than the fact that the balisage, the waymarkers for the GR trail, sent me off on a tangent when the centre of Saint-Gilles was already visible, straight ahead down the main road. I should've ignored the signs and just kept walking along the main road, because after taking me on a tour of the industrial district and mini-storage facilities of Saint-Gilles, the GR trail markings brought me back to the road anyway. 🙄 I remembered that when I first walked this trail nine years ago, the entry into the town was different; and when I arrived at the pilgrim hostel, the hospitalier on duty confirmed that the route had changed. I guess I got distracted by the cutout pilgrim figure, which convinced me to go down the trail rather than walk on the road!
The new route does, however, have the merit of bringing you into town across a scenic bridge over the Canal du Rhône à Sète, and taking you past a string of cafés and shops that I hadn't even realised were there, the last time I came. And it is marked with symbols of the Chemin de Compostelle everywhere - on the pavement, on the signs, even on the planters. For this is the first stage on the Voie d'Arles, or Via Tolosana: the least commonly walked of the four major pilgrimage routes across France converging on Saint-Jean-Pied-du-Port, but still a better-known route than the Via Domitia!
And in fact tonight I am staying at a proper pilgrim hostel - the same one as I stayed at nine years ago - and I have my own personal hospitalier, seeing as no-one else is staying here! I may well be the only pilgrim that Marc sees during his one-week shift, this late in the year. The hostel closes on November 15th, so I hope he will have some work to do shutting up for the season, to keep him busy if no other pilgrims stop by! 😅
The town of Saint-Gilles emerged in the eleventh century around the Benedictine monastery founded by Saint Gilles. According to the legend promoted by the monks of the monastery, Saint Gilles was Aegidus, an illustrious Greek of the seventh century who became so well-known and sought-after for his miracles that he preferred to flee his native land and take refuge in a hermitage by the Rhône. While he was searching for the spot, a deer fleeing the royal hunt took refuge in the saint's arms. When the king discovered that one of his arrows had struck and wounded the holy man instead of the deer, he offered him the land on which to build his monastery, as compensation.
That may not sound like a lot to build a sainthood on, but the legend of Saint Gilles became so popular that the abbey church of Saint-Gilles was the fourth most important site of pilgrimage in the medieval world, after Jerusalem, Santiago and Rome. The current church was constructed towards the end of the twelfth century, but if the interior looks newer than that, that's because it was severely damaged during the French Wars of Religion, a series of civil wars between French Catholics and Protestants from 1562 to 1598, when the Huguenots barricaded themselves inside the church; and again in 1794, following the Revolution.
The eleventh-century crypt below the church is traditionally a site of pilgrimage for women wishing to bear children. But when I descended the stairs to the crypt, it was the children themselves who were there: a small group of children stood singing before the saint's tomb.
My contemplation in the crypt of the church was rudely interrupted by my stomach reminding me that a hot chocolate is not normally considered lunch. I surfaced into the material world and made a quick trip to the supermarket around the corner for yogurt and bananas, just enough to tide me over until dinner time, when I cooked the rest of my spaghetti with zucchini and egg for Marc and I. We didn't have any Parmesan, but I added Comte cheese instead: a French version of the recipe! It tasted just fine!
Arles - Saint-Gilles 22.5 km
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