Ascent / descent: 1855m (41811m) / 1495m (41045m).
Altitude (start / end / highest): 740m / 1100m / 1959m.
Weather: Sunny.
Better rested in the morning than I've been for a long time am I ready for what has been advertised as a hard day. Until the restaurant at Plateau de Beille and thereafter Refuge de Rulhe there isn't any place to get food at on the trail in the next days. Fabrice at Le Petit Gîte is doing something to improve that situation, but more on that later. A well-organized walker shouldn't have any problems though. Anyway, I still got food in my backpack after supplying in Bagneres and Seix, so my backpack is a little bit heavier but I've got food for the next days.
Ruined farm on the trail between Siguer and Pla de Montcamp.
It's back to the solitary walking again, I still haven't seen Claire again after St Lizier, and apart from the random day trippers I haven't met many others. I meet some of these again up at Col de Gamel (1390m) after walking up the hill above Siguer through Gestiès and past several derelict remains of old farm buildings.
Up Crête de la Bède and on Col de la Lène (1695m) there are sheep running everywhere. The woods are left behind and in front of me a green field is swaying upwards towards Pla de Montcamp. When I look back at Lercoul on the other side of the valley I can't help wonder about how strange the location of the village really is. The summit of Pla de Montcamp (1904m) is a flat meadow, to get the best view in every direction on the summit you have to follow the edge of the meadow around. Mountains all around, but to the north you can all see down towards the lowlands. Great, had it not been for the bothersome flying ants that bite.
Pla de Montcamp. View back towards Pic de la Bède and further back in the horizon Port de Saleix.
In the direction I'm going I can see Plateau de Beille and in the horizon the mountains of Andorra. Down towards Col du Sasc (1798m) I pass some tents, a camping wagon and Cabane du Besset d'en Haut, an odd collection. At the remains of an old orri that now has been made into a cairn I let go off my backpack and walk fast away from the small biting blighters. The summit above at 1959m was tempting, Pic du Col Taillat with a nice view over to Pla de Montcamp and Crête de la Bède.
View south from Pla de Montcamp, Plateau de Beille to the right and in the background the mountains of Andorra.
The next part of the GR10 could be difficult in weather with bad visibility. A large herd of cows has gathered around Cabane de Courtal Marti (1812m) and then the trail is going down in a valley where the trail is hard to follow. The ruins of Cabane de Balledreyt (1600m) is a fitting symbol of the trail that goes past Jasse de Sirbal (1350m) and then up again to Col de Sirmont (1693m), cluttered and unclear. The cowbells of a herd of cows are making a peculiar sound when they resonate through some formations in the mountainside above.
I've moved up in the terrain again, to Col de Sirmont and there I take a food break before the trail goes down on the last descent of the day. Up to nearby Sirmont (1730m) I scare up a herd of paranoid cows that are running scared away. But not smart enough (clearly) to see that they are running straight to the summit that I'm walking towards, and so they have to run scared away from there as well. This was to be a repeating theme.
View over to Pla de Montcamp from Pic du Col Taillat above Col de Sasc.
It's miles away from being flat on the way down, the trail has been changed but I still follow the old way marking that crosses the Ruisseau de Calvière further up than the newly marked route. By the river I fill up water and add some water purifiers. You can't just drink straight from the water here in the Pyrenees, there are so many grazing animals here that you need to know where the water is coming from to be sure if you can drink it or not. By adding a water purifier now the water will probably be ready to drink when I've arrived at Cabane de Clarans.
Cabane de Clarans is a small hut with nothing else than a flatbed, a small table and a small fireplace inside. And the hut gives you the feeling of being located in a somewhat remote valley, there is tall grass outside the hut and quiet. Today I pitch my tent, I've used my tent way too little than I've both wanted to and could have, even though I've been anxious to use it because of the tent pole breaking early on the walk. After having relaxed for a while outside the hut with cup of freshly cooked tea, I go for a walk up to a small dammed lake above Coudènes (1040m), Barrage de Riête. On the way back I gather firewood for the evening.
Paranoid cows on the top of Sirmont. Pic du Col Taillat on the other side of the valley.
As said, there isn't any food to get at any place on the way after Siguer, but wait that isn't entirely true. Because Fabrice is doing what he can to make life easier for walkers on the GR10 in this area, he's carrying up food to another cabane nearby. Tin cans, but are you short of food this would be much appreciated. Fabrice had also promised me there would be beer there, but when I walk there this stock has been sold out (not that it mattered). Instead I buy myself some dessert for the dinner, rice cream and a fruit cocktail.
It's quiet in the evening and while I'm sitting and using my gas stove while making dinner I can hear the distinct sound of two sticks hitting the ground. I arise and in the end of the meadow I can see Claire coming. And me that didn't believe I would see her again, it's nice to meet her again. She'd taken another route than I had after St Lizier d'Ustou, but she'd apparently stayed in Siguer as well.
Camping outside Cabane de Clarans.
We then had a nice evening, even though the Pyrenean fauna wanted it otherwise. While I'm making a fire in the fireplace inside the cabin we hear some wrenching screams in the dark outside. Sounds no one of us has heard before. The screams are however forgotten when there is a fire in the fireplace and we can relax inside in the light of the flames. When it's bedtime after a great day I sneak outside to my tent and listens to the sounds of the nature in the night.
We should later on get to know that the sounds we heard were just the sound of deer screaming.
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