Day 4 – To Col d’Ares

A relaxing morning getting the blog up to date, and reading The Tunnel by Ernesto Sabato.

The site had been good. After dark the place comes into its own. The flies bed down for the night, the sky is striking, and the bar and restaurant very sociable with good food, homemade chick pea burger. The dogs wake up from dozing in the shade all day and play around together. I was back at van at 10 and sat out for an hour or so appreciating the cool of the night.

As the heat built we left Terra del Compost, half a mind to stay an extra night, but necessary was a trip to the river, the Riu Noguera Ribagorçana. It was just after 2 pm when we got there and already 32C.

Some forecasts were predicting stormy rain from late afternoon, and as expected the humidity grew. But the river delivered, mainly because it had an ample supply of sticks. And after I had had enough of throwing them, there were some small children to entertain Roja also. These were from www.7×7.family from Czech Republic on a world tour. They have been heading for Africa for the last year, waiting now for the Morocco border to open.

I’ve met a few of these sort of families over the years, most seeming more purposeful than this one. Even with children younger than high school age I think taking them away for longer than 6 months is hard on them. They may have ‘home education’ sorted, but it’s hard to compensate for what they miss out on socially. For longer than 6 months, with kids above 10 years old, I think it can be a bit selfish of the parents.

The spot we were on the river is the beginning of a tremendous little road / track over the lo Pedro mountain, giving incredible views of the whole of the Sierra de Montsec range. It is not recommended for cars, but had tempted me since I first spotted it. A link to it is here, and a photo of the route below. I need to write the whole post in html to embed it, and that takes too long.. (https://mapy.cz/s/rabacedola)

We got to the Col at 1510 metres at just before 5, and it’s a great place to stay for the night. No one else for a long way, a few hundred metres from the Montsec Astronomical Observatory, and a very pleasant 21C.