Walk This Way

Dinner featured sliced, tender duck flank and a regional dish called aligot -- a rich and delicious off-the-calorie-charts puree made from potatoes, butter, cream and tomme cheese. When made right and served warm, as it was in this case, it has the elasticity of pizza dough.

The following morning, after a breakfast of croissants, bread and more butter and cheese, we set out our bags in the hallway and hit the trail, stopping on the edge of town to fill our water bottles from the first of many spring-fed fountains.

The main season for walking the Compostelle trail is May through September. In May, wildflowers are in bloom, the risk of rain is minimal and hikers avoid the heat of summer and the risk of hiking on afternoons with triple-digit temperatures. On our trip in the second half of April, we had no rain and benefited from days in which the temperatures climbed from the 50s to touch 80 degrees in the afternoon.

That first day, our topographical guide informed us, meant about 4 1/2 hours of walking. The first 2 1/2 hours would take us to the village of Aubrac. From the start, the GR 65 was well marked, with an insignia of a white bar over a red bar affixed to street signposts or painted on trees, fence posts or rocks.

We walked through high pastures covered with wild daffodils and violets and divided by low, gray, dry stone walls that snaked to a brilliant blue horizon. A constant light wind blew, and the only sound came from a chorus of what seemed like thousands of swallows darting above us. We crossed small streams in the grass, walked through moss-covered forests of beech and oak trees, and came upon several religious shrines and crosses where pilgrims and other walkers had built piles of small stones.

We were told that the population of Aubrac could be counted on both hands. Yet there is something majestic about the way this diminutive burg sits at the top of a gentle rise in the landscape, with its church towers and a shelter for pilgrims that dates to the 12th century.

What Aubrac lacks in population it makes up for in lunch options, with four restaurants. We sat outdoors in a courtyard, ate fresh cold meats and local cheese and baguettes with fresh butter, all washed down with red wine. Then we walked on for another two hours to the serene village of Saint-Chely-d'Aubrac, set in a small river valley. As promised, our bags awaited us inside the door of the local inn.

In Saint-Chely, there is one cafe in the one square in town. Later that afternoon, we ordered cool drinks and sat at one of several plastic tables set in the sun. I chatted in French with a stranger I'd said hello to that morning in Nasbinals. On this route, with most everyone headed in the same direction, you tend to encounter the same travelers over and over again -- on the trail, at breakfast and dinner at the hotel, cafes such as this one.

He was in his 50s with gray hair and a beard. He explained that he'd begun his journey eight days earlier in Le Puy with the idea of taking a month off from his job with a security company in Dijon to walk to the Spanish border. Now, he said, he was convinced he could not go back -- even if it meant quitting his job -- before finishing the two-month trek to Santiago, Spain.

"Once you start," he said, draining his beer, "you have to go all the way."

We parted ways and then something strange happened.

About 40 minutes after we left the cafe and headed back to our hotel, I realized that I had not paid our cafe tab. In this tiny town, I wondered, would someone be coming after me?