So Ive left France eventually, for those of you not that interested in reading about the last few months from Switzerland, I have a summary for you:

It was cold, it rained A LOT.

It snowed to the point that I was stuck with roads impassable and passes closed. I spent November in St Alban because I wanted to, this was perhaps unwise as when I wanted to leave I was alarmed to be stranded by the weather and at its beck and call.

Switzerland is fabulous and expensive, though typically the value for money is good, France is a great country to travel through especially by bike and even more so on the Camino. I still cant explain why the French cant flush a toilet or in my experience communal ones, cant turn left without first turning right or produce good pop music.

The plumbing has improved dramatically in the last 10years and I don’t mean squat toilets, they never bothered me. The food in general, wine, sausages and cheese are each enough of a reason to visit. The people particularly out of the cities are great having lost much of their aloof attitude. I was surprised at how close I came to holding conversations in French, this may perhaps be part of my improved take on the people. This time 90% of the locals I spoke or spent time with were great, just great. I cant say if this is due to luck, a change in my attitude or my improved ability to communicate in French, I suspect its a mixture of all three.

It took some time before I had a decent meal in France that I didn’t cook myself, but once I broke the pattern man was it good! The roast duck thighs in Lectoure were really special.

The French seemingly still cant roast a chicken, if you get a roast chicken thigh in your Menu, I can guarantee it will be stringy, but this is probably a function of stingy cooking times or just my bad luck, probably. On the whole when driving they are decent to cyclists, though there is a man known to me as “le idiot de Gers” and a girl both of whom I would happily flail the skin from their backs.

The Gites are generally easy, uncomplicated to use and warm a great place to visit and perhaps to stay.