Starting to feel as a pelgrim! My European pilgrimage on a bicycle! #Compostela #cycling
I’m getting up really early to get a pilgrims blessing here at the Basilica in Vézelay good morning I'm Kaat I'm Poefi and we are from Steps by Kaatje or should I say Wheels by Kaatje because we are still on our cycling trip through Europe through France up to the Pyrenees at least if I can get there in three weeks we'll see but so this is day nine and I'm still in Auxerre and we stayed last night here in this beautiful place behind me which is really neat because well we have a little private park we can get into so it's really a nice place to stay but of course we can't stay we have to get on our bike and start cycling in the direction of Vézelay come on let's go what a great start of the day cycling next to the canal nice and flat love it I don't like dirt roads that much to cycle on but if the alternative is climbing up the hill then the choice is easy and I sure prefer the dirt road this channel was built in the early 1800s so that they could transport wood down to Paris and there are numerous locks on this canal and on each lock they built those nice little houses for the lock keeper and they don't have a name they just have a number this is number 73 and so by 1860 there was a railroad which was a lot faster so it kind of stopped being used and it got overgrown and now it's back up for tourism for little boats that can go up here in summertime and enjoy the scenery It’s 12 o'clock so I think time to have my lunch it's a bit of an early lunch but I'm leaving the Canal du Nivernais right here so I thought it would be good to have my lunch here before I head up because I did 43 kilometers up until now and I have about 15 kilometers left to go but part of this is a lot more uphill than it has been well it has been flat almost all the time so and especially the last three kilometers they go really up steep so I'm not sure that I'm gonna be able to cycle up there but we'll just have to see but I need a bit of power I was hungry so time to eat my lunch see it's a it's a healthy lunch today I bought a salad last night and so now I have a healthy lunch looks pretty good I know the last three kilometers has a steep climb But still nine kilometers away and this goes up steep as well is is the reward entering the town of Vézelay and I'm walking now most of it I did on my bike but now I don't feel guilty most people are walking here anyway so Poefi and I we made it to Vézelay you can see the Basilica behind me and I think it's really interesting really beautiful so I'm gonna go inside later but for now I just wanted to say well we did 60 kilometers today in the last nine kilometers were really hard but we knew that in advance so you can prepare and we just simply walked up the last kilometer I think I'm staying at the Abbey tonight which I think is going to be interesting because I will be meeting other pilgrims and we'll see what the evening brings and I'll see you guys in the morning all right good night good night hey good morning it's really early and I'm getting up to go to the Basilica for the pilgrims blessing I’m really curious about that I think it’s going to be interesting I just finished up my first climb of today I really had this great experience this morning at the Pilgrim's blessings it was really special and so Vézelay is really a special town on the pilgrimage and you sure have to make a stop here if you are on this trail on a bike or walking you definitely have to stop here I stayed at the convent of Sainte Madeleine and they were really nice people there they had some volunteers that took care of us and there were seven girls in the girls dormitory and I think there were like two or three guys so not too many people and we all went together to the blessings this morning which was nice so but for me so this is day 10 and I'm still going I need to do 80 90 kilometers today and it's going to be a lot of up and down so I better start out because it's already getting late come on It’s starting to rain so Poefi you'll have to go into the bag no no yeah yeah so put you in there ok ok ok I’m putting my credential booklet in there keep that dry should stay dry now all right let's go I'm I cycling in the rain just cycling in the rain what a glorious feeling I'm happy today am I I've been riding for about two hours in the rain now so I finally found this little shelter so I can have a little bit of lunch I did 37 kilometers up until now and I still have more than around 50 to go so but okay well I hope the road is going to be better and faster and maybe the rain will stop we can always hope sometimes you have to look back and see where you came from and listen to the birds making a little sugar stop at Prémery but done 60 kilometers and another 30 to go oh well cheers as you can see I made it to Nevers and I did 90 kilometers to get here and I had like two three hours of rain so it was going slow because it was up and down but I knew that before I left at Vézelay and so it wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be but it sure wasn't as good as I hoped it was going to be but oh well I'm here and I have a hotel room I have had dinner and I think I'm gonna go and have an early night and I'm gonna sleep in a little bit tomorrow because I'm taking a shorter day tomorrow right so good night morning this is day 11 of my journey and I'm here at the chapel in Nevers where Saint Bernadette is buried you know Saint Bernadette she's the girl who saw Maria in Lourdes a few times I think and after she was in Lourdes she came over here to spend the rest of her life here in the convent of Nevers and she was buried here in the church she's buried in a glass coffin and you can see through you can still see her so it was really impressive to see her but I couldn't take any pictures out of respect of course we wanted to do that to do this this morning and so now I'm going to start cycling I'm going up to Saint-Amand-Montrond and it's about 73 kilometers it's a nice start of the day I can cycle here next to the canal the Canal Latéral à la Loire flat for the moment so trying to make some kilometers you see this sign that's the route I'm following the old roads this is a really special place here you have the canal but look over here this is the river the canal goes over the river And this is one big lock in World War II part of France was occupied by the Germans part of it wasn't so it was up until here and so we’re here we're now crossing into the non-occupied zone of France it's one o'clock time for lunch and I have a tuna fish salad and of course some water to drink cheers Poefi and I, we made it to Saint-Amand-Montrond and we did 78 kilometers which is as always more than what I planned so I have to make sure that the next days I don't plan more than 70 kilometers because otherwise I'm gonna do way too much and I'm not gonna be able to enjoy because I'm doing too much so but for now well I arrived here at about six o'clock tonight and it seems like the place is kind of booked up for the evening for the weekend so I couldn't find any cheap places like the Youth Hostel was fully booked so I I found this more expensive room but it does have a big advantage because it has a bath oh yeah I love taking a bath oh yeah I do too so that's what I'm going to do tonight I'm going to take a bath and I'm going to enjoy it and I'll see you guys in the morning the Poefi is making friends good morning I'm leaving Saint-Amand-Montrond I'm gonna do or at least I'm gonna try to do about 70 kilometers today which should be enough it's gonna be a rainy day so I'm all dressed for the rain and let's keep fingers crossed that we don't have too much rain come on that's me today I'm really lucky I'm here at Le Châtelet I've only done 24 kilometers but I found this market supermarket still open on a Sunday morning so I've got myself something to eat which is really good I do feel like I'm going really slow today that was a good lunch and the funny part is there was another pilgrim who came into the store to get some stuff and he also was a Belgian it's the first Belgian I ran into and he's on foot he's doing the whole way to Santiago Compostela on foot oh well I guess he has a bit more time than than I have yeah it was fun oh boy this rain just started pouring down on me while I was coming down from the village oh I'm completely soaked it kind of stopped now so I'm just gonna wait a little bit longer and then I'll just go and start cycling again I have arrived at Zarzay which is about six kilometers out of La Châtre and I did a total about 63 kilometers today which isn't too much but I was really slow today I needed to be slow I guess I'm just tired it's my 12th day so yeah I guess I start feeling that that I've been almost cycling almost every day and I have arrived here I'm here I'm staying here in the little house behind me and it's a really neat place because I also have a little garden I'm gonna show you and I already put up the washing that I did last night and that didn't dry during the night so now in the sun it will be dry in a minute let me show you the inside of the house I have two beds I can choose which one to sleep in I feel like I'm traveling into time at least 50 years maybe even a bit more and I have a basic bathroom with a shower oh everything I need I even have a dry toilet I think I'm gonna be fine here the lady of the house she's cooking me dinner so I don't have to worry about that and for now I'll go have a shower relax and see what I can do and since this is day 12 that means this is the end of my third video of my trip so I'm saying goodbye to you guys and if you don't want to miss the next part don't forget to subscribe to give me a like and to ring the little bell that way next time I put up a video you'll get a notification all right but for now I'll see you guys on the next one bye
2023-05-25 09:06
