June 10th - Suffering in the name of art

John doesn’t generally do mornings. His argument, these days, is he doesn’t have to. So getting up at 6.45am on a Saturday, so that I could take a few photos of some sheep, was nothing short of heroic. Doubly so after a late night!

Sheep? Well, yes.

Twice a year, many villages in the Pyrenees celebrate something known as the Fête de la Transhumance. The first, in late spring, happens as the shepherds move their flocks to the mountain pastures. The second, in autumn, coincides with the flocks’ return. Because of the remote nature of the participating villages, and the early hour, visitors to the area rarely see the Défilé des Troupeaux, and are simply bemused by postcards showing flocks of sheep wearing bells and brightly-coloured pom-poms. However, last Monday, we found a flyer stuffed under our car windscreen wiper, advertising the event at Mauléon Barousse. I said that it might offer some good photos, and John, in a rash moment, agreed to drive me there on Saturday morning. But that was before Flick rang and invited us to dinner on Friday evening …

It was raining slightly when we arrived at Flick and Hans’ place, where the Garonne river races by at the bottom of the garden. But the gloomy June weather was quickly forgotten over a bottle or two of red wine, in front of the fire in their cosy living room, and a curry supper. Unfortunately, so too was the clock. It was nearly 1am by the time we struck out for the invigorating uphill homeward march. Nevertheless, we were determined to be up and at ‘em when the alarm went off a few hours later.

The flyer stated that the flocks would assemble in the Place de Palouman between 6.30am and 9am, with free coffee being offered to the bergers and pâtres (both words apparently mean ‘shepherd’, and I am at a loss to explain the difference). So leaving Montréjeau at 7.45am, we reckoned we would be in plenty of time for a few photos. Not so. As it happened, arriving in Mauléon Barousse at 8.15am, we only just made it. As I opened the car door, I could hear the deafening sound of hundreds of clanging bells, as the sheep started up the main street. A sea of them. Not quite so colourfully decorated as the postcards, but impressive just the same. Five minutes later it was all over. The flocks and shepherds were gone, leaving a pungent aroma of sheep shit, coffee and Gauloise® in their wake. At least I got a couple of photos.

Back in Montréjeau, I whipped up a suitably hearty breakfast to compensate for the single, rushed, cup of coffee we had had before leaving home. But all was not well. Initially, we put JR’s lack of energy down to the combination of the late night and early morning start. However, soon he was complaining of a leaden feeling in his arms and legs, and his stomach was playing up. A bowl of onion soup at lunchtime did nothing to revive him. By 3pm John had to admit defeat and retired to bed … where he stayed until he woke with severe intestinal cramps at 2.30am on Sunday morning.

I’ll admit that this was a bit of a worry. It is usually me that is the first to complain of gastric upsets, as a result of which, we have acquired an impressive array of remedies. Some of the medicines we have bought in France have great names. Smecta®, for instance, always sounds to me like one of those spy organisations from an early James Bond novel. But this time John was not in the least amused when I presented him with a box of the, appropriately-named, anti-spasmodic, Spasfon®. “Don’t you dare tell David or Mike”, he said, “I’ll never hear the end of it”.

As if I would …

Anyway, I’m glad to report that, 48 hours later, John is now, hopefully, on the mend.

This entry was posted on 10/06/2008 at 11:18 pm and is filed under Uncategorised. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.

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