Verdon Gorge --- Sentier Martel

Joseph and I, who were sharing a room, woke up the next morning somewhat the worse for wear.  Joseph because his bed was uncomfortable, me because of Joseph.  I don't know why, but more often than not I seem to end up sharing a room on a hike with snorers.  Because of this I've taken to checking beforehand whether or not people snore... but Joseph wasn't aware that he did.  It was a close-run thing, but I didn't kill him.

After breakfast we walked down a few hundred meters to the start of the trail through the gorge.  Named after the leader of the first expedition to traverse the gorge (in 1905), the Sentier Martel was created in 1928 and is justly renowned as one of the finest hikes in France.  Here's a view of the start of the hike (you can just see stairs to the right of the river where it seems to disappear):

Thereafter the trail goes into a series of tunnels, with fairly rough floors, occasional rocks, and many deep puddles.  The longest tunnel is over 650m long and very dark... fortunately I had a headlamp with me, so we were able to avoid falls and the deepest puddles.  Here's a view of the river in the tunnelled section:

And then we were in the main body of the gorge, which is just beautiful.  Here's a typical view:

The trail went up and down, with occasional cables and ladders, of which these were the largest:

The weather was warm and sunny but not too hot, there were a fair number of other hikers, but not too many... it was a perfect day.  Or at least it would have been had Joseph not bonked.  Bonking, also known as hitting the wall, happens during sustained exercise when one has used up all of one's stored glycogen.  At that point, all stamina disappears -- regardless of how well trained you are -- and walking 50m up a moderate incline is about all one can do before one needs to stop to recover.  Joseph was in good shape, but he had never hiked on rough rocky paths, nor used hiking poles, and there's an art to that, so he didn't walk efficiently.  As a result, although all three of us ate more or less the same amount for breakfast and lunch, Joseph was the only one to bonk.  And unfortunately, his idiot guide (who shall remain nameless) hadn't thought to arrange any source of back-up energy.  Which left Joseph doing this a lot:

Fortunately soon after this photo was taken we came across a young family who gave us some biscuits... and ten minutes later Joseph's energy levels were trending upwards again.

We emerged from the gorge around 5PM, having started the day's hike at 8:45AM, tired, but happy.  And this time Françoise was waiting for us :-).  She drove us 8km to the nearby village of La Palud sur Verdon (the Refuge de la Maline, at the edge of the gorge, being closed for repairs), where we checked into our charming B&B, Le Perroquet Vert.  A shower and a good dinner later, at around 9:15PM, we were in bed and falling asleep....