The life of a mountain man

It was only a few minutes before my host, Viktor, was there to pick me up. Here's the scoop on Viktor: 

He grew up in England, but had a distaste for city life and ended up WWOOFing (World wide opportunities on organic farms) with his boyfriend for six years, living out of a van and moving around doing handiwork. At one point, he was also a mountain climbing instructor, and then he started managing websites and built his own home here in the mountains of southwest France. He also built his mom's second house here, 200m away up the mountain, and is an ovolactarian.

By the way, WWOOFing is basically a worldwide network of organic farms that offer lodging for people who come and volunteer on the farm as hands. Now, Craig is a CouchSurfing AND WWOOF host at his cabin. He has a wood burning stove/heater, a composting toilet, no refrigerator, an Internet connection through a wire than runs down from his mom's house (after passing through a solar powered amplifier) and runs all his electricity from the solar panels installed on his house which store up energy in batteries. This is the most ridiculously awesome thing ever. 

So anyway, to take a shower, you stand outside and hose yourself off with rainwater collected in basins at the corner of his cabin, which runs down the hose from a reserve farther uphill. It's cold. If you want a hot shower, you have to heat up some water, carry it in a bucket to a place a few yards from the cabin and use a pulley system to lift it up to get pressure through the hose while you shower. Rain water isn't for drinking, so he has several large bottles that act as the reserve for drinking water which can be refilled at a Spring water spigot further down the mountain. He gathers firewood every couple of days to keep his stove lit when it's cold and it doubles as an oven. Pretty cool. I keep thinking my brother should be here with me. He's definitely more of a mountain man than I am. And also, this is the view from my shower. 

And the view when I wake up.

On Sunday morning I slept in and went up to his mom's cabin for WiFi, ventured around a little bit, and took some pictures of the many many lizards that inhabit the area (and some butterflies, because they were everywhere). 

This one got scared of me, ran over the barrier, and when I stopped moving for a minute it peeped its head back over to make sure I wasn't about to kill it. 

Later we went hiking up to the top of the mountain to get a good view of the surrounding area and the Spanish border. Many of his neighbors rise animals or run farms of their own, so it's not uncommon to see pigs and cows and such. Also, it's basically impossible to go outside without hearing an entire chorus of cowbells. 

Then we got hit with a downpour, and, having left the cabin with sunny weather, I hadn't thought to bring an umbrella, so we had to take shelter under a small tree until it passed. And you can see it coming in the distance, too: 

At this point, we were like, "Oh, crap."

Things to know about mountains:

Never assume the weather will be nice (or not nice). 

Always wear jeans. Not shorts. Oy vey.

Bring a jacket. 

Watch the ground at all times. 

It gets very cold at night even if it's warm in the day time. 

Weather varies between mountains since air currents can get trapped.

The tree we took shelter under. 

Then dinner happened. Everything here is non refrigerated so once it's out of the bag or can or off the vine (so to speak) it has to be eaten within a certain amount of time. Normally this means a big dinner with leftovers to be eaten for lunch the next day. Monday night, we had stir fry!

Viktor's stir-fry sauce, made of tomato paste, peanut butter, soy sauce, and sesame seed oil. Looks weird, tastes great. 

On Tuesday we went out for an excursion in the mountains farther away from his home. 

This is hilarious. Covoiturage is just the French way of saying ride share.

This trip was the greatest outdoor excursion I've done so far. The way up was really long, and we were originally only planning on going to the first waterfall, but after getting there we kept convincing each other to keep going. I don't think I've ever generated so much sweat in my life, but it was so worth it. The view was unbelievable. 

Our mountain in the distance.

This means "Blow holes." I don't know how they function, but it means that where there are cracks between rocks, cold air blows out. Like natural air conditioning. 

The way back down was MUCH more painful than the way up. I thought my ankles were going to give up on life. But they didn't, so all is well in the world. I did, however, run out of Twix when we'd made it to the bottom, which means things are potentially not all well in the world. We shall see. At any rate, the number of Twix bars I've consumed in France is in the thirties. Win. 

On the way home, we picked up two Norwegian guys named Johannes and Andrea we met up in the mountains who were trying to hitchhike towards Saint-Girons. They were on holiday from school, just traveling around the mountains, camping and hitching their way through basically all of Western Europe. They were 20! Makes me feel inadequate. But Viktor invited them to hang out and stay at his place for the night, so they came with us and set up their tent and we all took our socks off in the cabin. I have never smelled anything so gut-wrenchingly EW. They made themselves dinner at the cabin, and I took Viktor and I out for pizza in town because I didn't feel like cooking. I went big; bacon, tomatoes, onions, something I can't pronounce, cream, cheese... and I got a large all to myself. I also got to try crème brûlée for the first time ever and it was SO good. They literally stand there with a torch and burn the top so it looks all nice and becomes crystallized. Mmmm.

When we had gotten back, we exhanged contact information with the Norwegian guys and wished them luck, and they headed out Wednesday morning with Viktor in his car to go hitchhiking to the rest of their amazing adventure. I'm here just til tomorrow (Thursday) to hitchhike and take a train and hitchhike more from Saint-Girons, to Foix, to Latour, to Barcelona, to Valencia.

Today (Wednesday, keep up now) I made French toast for lunch because Craig mentioned he had maple syrup that a Canadian CouchSurfer had give him as a gift. Unfortunately, when we opened it (after I'd made the toast of course) it was all moldy (not having a fridge probably aided in that process), I made an impromptu sauce from honey (he has a giant bucket of solid country-style honey), Nutella, and butter which actually turned out to be really good! European country-side style American French toast. Yeesh. 

I ground the cinnamon in this thing? Legit!

Making French toast on a gas grill. 

Viktor's first experience with not-actually-French-toast.

This afternoon we took Chispa (his dog) for a walk and I saw my first chestnut. They grow in spiky green balls that fall off of trees, and then you have to open them up to get at the chestnut inside. Plants are weird. 

If you just read the bigger letters, it says "Warning danger. It is dangerous." 

Awwww Chispa!

NOW WE ARE WATCHING MEAN GIRLS. Technically, Mean Girls day is October 3, and it's the second here today, but Viktor has never seen it and it's a must for all gays and I won't be here tomorrow, so this will have to do.

 Life in the mountains has been fun, but I'm definitely ready to head off to Spain. I've wanted to go for eight or nine years now, and the fact that I'll be there tomorrow is probably going to keep me up all night. Life is beautiful, guys! Embrace it! 

*･゜ﾟ･*:.｡..｡.:*･'(*ﾟ▽ﾟ*)'･*:.｡. .｡.:*･゜ﾟ･*

"Why aren't you white?"

"Oh my God, Karen, you can't just ask people why they're white!"

Don't be a republican in France

Instead of hitching from Paris to Toulouse, I just chose to book a ride online through BlaBlaCar/covoiturage. It only set me back €40, and a train ride would have been at least three times as much, and as far as hitchhiking was concerned, I wanted zero more surprises, at least for a six and a half hour drive after having my stuff taken. I met up with my driver, Sara, and two other guys headed for Toulouse on Saturday morning and had an uneventful drive. The country was nice to look at, but there wasn't much talking or anything since my French is awful and I didn't feel I like forcing three French people to make slow conversation with me while I tried to concentrate on understanding over the sound of the car. 

When we got to Toulouse, though, Sara asked me what my plans were. I told her I was going to Saint-Girons either by hitching or ride share, and as for lodging for the night, I was simply going to seek out a hostel and put up a couchsurfing request online and explore the city while I waited for a reply. 

"How about you come to my mom's house? It's on the way to Saint-Girons, we're going to celebrate her birthday tonight." Wow! Of course, not one to turn down the kindness of strangers, I accepted and she called to make sure it was alright with her mom. She gave an enthusiastic, "Bring him over!" And I was on my way! 

We picked up her boyfriend in Toulouse and I played around with a soccer ball with his kids for a while before heading out. We passed a small town called Foix (and the Castle of Foix) and went up into the mountainside to a huge house in the middle of nowhere. I think the village name was Bermajou or something along those lines, 40km south of Saint-Girons. We walked in to meet Sara's brother and parents, who were absolutely the nicest and most straightforward people ever. We talked about everything from politics to American vs French culture to the price of land in France. They were very engaging and maybe purposefully dumbing down their French so I could understand, and every once in a while they didn't seem bothered by my total lack of French and helped out with some English. My favorite part of the conversation went something like:

"But we have to ask you a question."

"Oh... Okay?"

"Est-ce que tu es republicain?" ('Are you republican?' They asked this in the context of Texas gun laws and religion in the South).

"Est-ce que je dois repondre?" (Should I answer that?) 

Sara's mom stared at me, waiting for my answer.

"Uh... Je suis pas republicain. L'autre côté bien sûr." (I'm not republican, I'm on the other side, of course."

Suddenly the air was much lighter and Sara's dad went "Bon reponse!" Good answer! And then we ate an enormous wonderful meal of fried potatoes, pork ribs, wine, cheese, bread... the essentials. It was fantastic. Sara's mom reminded me very much of my Aunt Stacy's mom. Living out on a farm, powerful personality, full of life, and very hospitable. People aren't as different as you might imagine them to be, even if they grew up five thousand miles away and forty years before you. Anyway, we stayed up pretty late talking and by the time we were ready to go to bed, Sara's boyfriend had offered to give me a ride to Foix where I could hitch out to St. Girons the next morning. Then I slept in an enormous comfy bed. 

The next morning I woke up around ten and basically had breakfast forced on me. Sara's mom asked if I wanted food and when I told her I didn't want to eat since no one else was (I'd woken up late), she told me I was weird and gave me food anyway; bread and orange juice with this freaking amazing home made fig jam. Then she walked me outside to show me her fig trees and I tried actual figs for the first time. 

Figs grow on trees. You pick then when they're soft and light green. 

Then, you peel the skin off very carefully.

Take a bite out of the fruit, get as much as you can out, and enjoy. It tastes like honey mixed with avocado. It's a little strange but very, very sweet and delicious. 

Sara's boyfriend gave me a ride into town and I planned on exploring the castle before I hitched out of town. Unfortunately, it was closed, so all I really got was a bunch of pictures of the outside (and this one has a power line in it. Hurray!)

The view from the castle walls of the city and surrounding landscape. 

Then I went exploring around the creek which runs by the castle and through parts of the town. 

This is called a Croque-Monsieur, and is the best sandwich you'll ever have. It's got ham, cheese, bread, and some other stuff I couldn't identify, but it only cost me €2. Yay small towns!

After exploring a great deal of the city (it's really small) I decided to attempt hitching out, so I found a bakery and asked them for a 'carton et marquer pour faire un signe pour faire du stop.' I got an itty bitty cardboard box and a bright orange marker to make my hitching sign. And they gave me a baguette! 

By the way, the French government controls the price of baguettes. The reason for this is supposedly so people can always afford their daily bread. Ingenious! (But socialist, shhhhh)

The best place to hitch out of Foix is the bridge that runs between the main road and a roundabout leading out of town. As with my hitching adventure from nice, each exit is marked with the city that is located in that direction, so you just have to find the right sign, follow it, and look around where cars will be coming from and find a good vantage point to hitch. As luck would have it (and on a Sunday!) I met a 22 year old French NURSE named Sofia who already had finished a year of nursing school. At 22! She got her bachelor degree at 19. What the heck. Anyway, she was also a musician, and she was okay with hitching together. We sang stupid French songs to each other and she told me about her plans to travel to Texas for a month in a few weeks to do music stuff there. I told her she had a couch available in Missouri if she ever needed it, we exchanged Facebook information, and yelled obsenities at cars that passed us instead of picking us up (as a way of teaching her the different degrees of profanity in English, of course). After maybe an hour, a guy picked us up and we piled into his little car. He took us halfway to St. Girons, but that was perfect for Sofia because that's where she was headed. She wished me luck and I started walking along the road. I was just thinking about exploring this town own as well, but I had my thumb out walking down the main road, and literally not even two minutes after being dropped off, another driver pulled over and took me the rest of the way. Easy. 

I had finally made it to St. Girons! I sent my host a message over Skype and sat by the stream and ate my baguette. The town is gorgeous. 

Lizards are up here EVERYWHERE.