Lourdes , France

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I AM GOING TO BEGIN THIS BY MAKING AN APOLOGY FOR ALL FUTURE SPELLING ERRORS ON THESE PAGES. WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT IT COULD BE SO DIFFICULT TO TYPE ON A CHINESE KEYBOARD!

Right here goes...

Lourdes is a lot of things to a lot of people but to the pilgrims that make the journey year after year and in fact to any pilgrim that has made the journey it is what i'd call a suprisingly emotional experience.

Now I am not sure if I would have said that if I was to write this after the first or even the second day that I was there because up to then I couldn't see past the massive crowds (30,000 sitting for an 8.30am Wednesday morning mass kind of crowds) and the rows and rows, streets and streets of seemingly endless stalls and shops selling, lets be honest, more often that not very tacky rosary beads!

I am not going to talk about the religious side of the place other than to say that although religion has suffered a lot over the last number of years and maybe for good reason, when you make a clear distinction between religion and the church then it is clear to see when visiting Lourdes, that religion is most certainly not dead. The passion and belief that I saw in many peoples faces over the days I was there was simple staggering.

For me however, the real winner for the place, was the way that people in bad health were treated and cared for. An unwritten rule of Lourdes is that the sick always come first and I tell you one thing, they sure do....and rightly so too. It was amazing to see how the caring, the compassion and the charity shown by so many voluntary helpers. Truly admirable!

Anyway I will leave Lourdes at that just to say that I did get that chance to escape the Father Ted fest on a number of occasions and when you get outside the towns "Salthill on Holy Water" atmosphere, you get to see one hell of a beautiful spot! Got my first climb in! The 'Pic de Jer' at just shy of 1000m.....mind you the reward once I got to the top had to be shared as there is a cable car going up to the top so by the time sweaty Aidan reached the top there was a bunch of...lets just say not your typical hill walkers...many of which who were sporting shades of blue in their hair.... already munching into their cornettos!

(And I did climb it, I swear!)

I also managed to get up to Garvinie in the Pyrenees on the Friday. This place is just beautiful and with a few miles of a trek into the hills you reach the snow and the base of the highest waterfall in Europe. (Of course I had to do it, almost managing to miss my bus back because it took me a little to long. I was very trigger happy with the camera that day! Will post a pic or two when I get someplace to download them.

The route up from Lourdes to Garvinie is the route that Napolean took his men over the pyrenees and there are still bridges remaining (many now in ruins though) that he had built over the gorges to get his men through. These are truly amazing. To give you an idea without knowing exact figures, we stopped at one where you could bungee jump off. How the managed to build a bridge that high over a gorge without modern day technology and this bridge had a pretty large span by the way, I will never know!

Anyway....Hong Kong beckons....later...A.

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Photos

Lourdes, The Sanctuary
...from the mayhem!

Garvanie, Pyrenees
the highest waterfall in Europe!