A pale sun shines through the window, obscured by fast-moving clouds, but every few moments they undergo a renewed transition from light to dark and back to light again.
A very welcome morning greeting.
To the horses
I am particularly looking forward to this day, because the stage leads up to the Franches Montagnes, a horses' paradise.
The travelguide agrees (although I don't really believe the information about distance and duration anymore; yesterday's stage was in fact almost 3 kilometers longer).
After climbing the high plateau of the Franches Montagnes, you enter a quiet country with dark forests and scattered farms, surrounded by horses, cows and sheep. In between villages with mustard yellow houses. Saigneléger is the regional center.
Length 12 km; rise | descent 800 m | 280m; Hiking time 4 hours
Since the information in the guide seems less and less reliable, I'll share my own figures from now on; once again, they deviate quite a bit. The duration is clear, but the deviation in the distances is somewhat questionable..
Length 15.34 km; Hiking time 6 hours 29 minutes
Once again a small inconspicuous village stays behind, as always I would like to linger, enjoy the tranquility, take a deep breath.
But well, the plan does not allow exceptions, certainly not unplanned rest days, and so I look back one more time, to Soubey. The probability that I will return is very small. Bye bye, small charming village.
It seems to be a law of my poor orientation skills that I deviate from the route (or get lost) after just a few kilometers. But hiking along the wonderful river is also too tempting in order to interrupt it to cross an unimportant hill, only to be back at the river a little later.
One wonders if this dry summer has been without effect on this area. The meadows are lush green, the cornfields are in great shape, one might think that climate change is Trump Fake News. But, I am convinced, I will cross other areas in the course of the hike across Switzerland, yellow, burnt areas, Sahara here with us.
The Doubs is gurgling next to me for a while, this dreamy river as if it was from another time, it might be in Hobbit-land, where nature is still intact. I follow it at a slow pace, because not far from here, I will leave it for good, it will do a few more bends on Swiss territory, and then finally depart towards France.
One rarely encounters houses or stables or other evidence of human civilization. But of course, dwarves and other abominations in front of the garden houses are there, only Snow White is missing, she is asleep.
The land of house martins
One should have much more time to take care of the extraordinary flora and fauna of the area. Thus, only an occasional glance at information boards placed along the way is all I can do.
Apparently there are House Martins in this area, I quote from Wikipedia:
The range of the House Martin extends over almost the whole of Europe and extratropical Asia. Despite this large distribution area, only two subspecies are distinguished. House Martins are pronounced migratory birds. The West Eurasian breeding birds usually winter in Africa in an area stretching from the southern border of the Sahara to the Cape Province.
So they are also long-distance hikers or rather long-distance flyers. Of course it has all my sympathy.
Imagine - it flies from our areas to the Sahara, which is quite a stretch, but that's not enough, it even flies to South Africa occasionally if it feels like it.
Once again you can understand the advantages of the art of flying. Not 500 arduous kilometers on foot, no, 5000 or even more kilometers in the air, carried by the air currents, light as a feather and yet strong and courageous, they cross seas and entire continents.
I not only take my hat off, I bow my head.
By the way, not to forget, Europe alone has lost 600 million birds in the last few years. Please refer to Articles.
Upwards with thunderstorm
At a mill by the river (Le Moulin Jeannottat), long out of operation, I take a short break at the only dry place, listen for the last time to the enchanting gurgling of the river, which in a short time has found all my love. Here the path branches off.
With the Doubs at your back, the climb is now steep in parts, through forest sections similar to primeval forest and across dreamy pastures. It's about 400 meters in altitude to Les Pommerats. Once on the plateau of the Franches-Montagnes, you enter quiet country with dark forests, open pastures, old stands of trees and scattered farms surrounded by horses, cows and sheep.
The climb is indeed steep, after a short time one can hear my huffing and puffing far away. I slowly fumble my way uphill, through a green world, indeed a kind of jungle, in which one feels like a stranger, an uninvited guest.
In the middle of the jungle, just as quiet as a jungle is, heavy raindrops attack me out of nowhere, the weather forecast is for once unfortunately accurate. So quickly put on the rain gear, which turns out to be a bigger problem with my new backpack. In any case, I'm still cursing when the rain stops as suddenly as it started.
However, I am warned now, next time I will not be so easily surprised.
Alone and abandoned
So I eventually reach a flat meadow, take a breath, because this is only Les Pommerats. The path gets more pleasant, after a quarter of an hour I pass a secluded house, apparently abandoned and lonely.
The front door and windows are overgrown, it seems as if no one has been here for ages. A satellite dish still hangs by the entrance, the last signals have long since fallen silent.
Abandoned houses make me sad, they now lack everything they used to have to live on.
Maybe it's a good idea to give it a human presence for at least a few minutes. I fight my way through the tall grass to the house entrance and sit down on the stairs. Next to me, at mouth level, grow the most glorious grapes, just waiting to be picked and eaten.
You ought to give them to the children for snacking or make sweet grape juice out of them. But they just hang there, perhaps at least a feast for birds and insects.
As I ponder gloomy thoughts of abandonment, I look at my legs and feet, which doesn't do much to improve my mood.
No idea how I'll get the stuff back to a clean state. And I feel sorry for my shoes; in the meantime we are approaching the 1000 kilometer mark together. And the manufacturer Mammut has already taken them out of the assortment. Idiots!
According to the weather forecast, the weather should improve by tomorrow, i.e. sun, warmth, blue sky.
We will see.
One last stairway to heaven
It seems to be that way - at least once a day the Lord of Hiking (St. Christoporus?) punishes me with a steep arduous staircase to chase away any good mood for a while.
But then, out of the blue, the next wet greeting.
But this time I don't have the slightest desire to mess around with my stupid rain gear again and seek shelter beneath the overhanging branches of a fir tree.
This is what it looks like when a thunderstorm wants to annoy you.
However, I have to press myself very tightly against the tree trunk, sometimes the wind turns and blows its wet greetings right into my face.
But like the first time - after a few minutes the storm passes.
I don't trust it, and as will be revealed later, my gut feeling was not wrong.
The sky opens
Shortly afterwards the worst is over, the sky opens up, I'm on the Saignelegier plateau and I'm taking a deep breath.
The rain has vanished, may it stay away. A deep blue rests pensively over the high plain, a collar of clouds frames the painting.
And then, finally, here they are the horses. An ancient breed, the Freiberger, a treat for the eye. When you consider that they are the last Swiss horse breed, you feel a bit sad. But that's course of the world, the passage of time ...
I try every kind of approach, to no success. Understandable, if they would give a look to every hiker passing by, where would this end?
Anyway, the day's destination Saignelegier is now approaching rapidly, the first houses peek through the trees.
However, the welcome is not as hoped for, because two hundred meters short of the hotel I am surprised by a new storm, and this time it is a veritable downpour.
I squeeze myself close to a garage entrance, but with little success, and so I reach my hotel fifteen minutes later, quite wet and angry, but yes, nature happens outdoors.
A strange room
My hotel, the Café du Soleil, at the moment rather the Café de la Pluie, seems to be some kind of hippie accommodation. No objection, the rooms are very peculiar, one might think that the high price was set by the artistic decorations in the rooms.
But then another unpleasant surprise. While showering, I discover a tick that has dug into my thigh, but has already lost its upper half. I try to pull out the rest with tweezers, but even the help of the knife brings at most a maximum amount of blood to flow.
The rest of the procedure, including the search for suitable tools and disinfectants, I leave to the imagination of the reader. In the end, my good fortune and my brave immune system once again kept me going (but even now, a month and a half later, there is still a strange scar remaining, my only souvenir of Saignelegier, the horses' paradise).
Matching song: AC/DC – Thunderstruck
And here the trip continues ... to St. Imier, the former stronghold of the Swiss watch industry
