Espiens France, 27-07-2009
I don’t sleep well the night before long runs. I am anxious and fidgety. I worry that I will wake up to one of those days when I just don’t run well. That happens from time to time. It’s simply not possible to predict which will be a good running day and which will not.
This particular long run was scheduled for a Sunday. I prefer to make the Long Runs early in the morning whenever possible. But I did not wake up until 11am. It was already very hot and looked as if it would only get hotter. I postponed the run to the following day. It was a good decision. On the same hot day at about the same time I woke up, France’s President, Nicholas Sarkozy, went running in the park around Versailles. He collapsed after 45 minutes and had to be taken to the hospital. Sarkozy probably didn’t have the option to postpone his run to Monday. Still, this small decision, although born mostly out of procrastination, makes me feel wiser than the President of France.
Monday is ideal. There is light cloud cover and the temperature is perfect. I run my furthest distance yet: 25km in 2hrs 37 minutes. I check my time at the half-marathon distance (21km). My watch shows 2hrs 10 minutes. I am pleased so I reward myself by opening my last packet of Gu and venture into new and unknown distance territory. Only 4 more kilometers to go! It’s a good day for running.
I’ve chosen another one-way route: from Espiens to Nérac, through a circuit of the Parc de Garenne past the remains of a Templar Castle, then to Lavardac on the old road from Nérac, across the wooden bridge into the XIIIth century walled village of Vianne and back to Montplaisir in Lavardac on the other side of the Baïse this time.
The terrain and views are varied and spectacular. I like to imagine what people were doing on the same roads and paths 400, 500 or 800 years ago. Nérac was an important location before and during the reign of Henri IV in the 16th century. The women in his family: mother, grandmother and wife were renaissance era humanists and intellectuals. The court in Nérac attracted all sorts of philosophers, artists, poets and probably a fair number of hanger-ons, rogues and opportunists. My sort of people…. Henri was apparently most interested in watching women bathing in the river below his chateau.
Vianne is a 13th century perfectly preserved walled town built by a reputedly cruel lord called Jourdain de l’Isle in 1282. He was loyal to the Edward I of England, the son of Eleanor of Aquitaine and Henry Plantagenet. It changed hands between the French and English many times during the 100 year’s war and finally became permanently French in the 1400s.
What was on the minds of the people who traveled these paths and roads way back then? Were they walking? On horseback? Driving a mule cart to sell their produce at market?
Surely they had to be thinking about many of the same things I do. Is my family well provided for and prepared to deal with the world? Will anybody buy these damn things I am bringing to the market? What are my old friends and family up to right now? What do people really think about me? Am I a good person? Will the gates of Vianne be open when I arrive? Will there be French or English behind the gates? Will they let me in?
What’s for dinner tonight?
I hope some of the good wine remains.
