Day 11 – St Quentin to Tergnier

I am not afraid of the darkness. Real death is preferable to a life without living. Vasco da Gama

Wednesday 11/4/2018

Distance 29.2km Total Distance from Canterbury 287.2km

So I was somehow imbued during the night with the pioneering and exploring spirit of Vasco da Gama. I have three guidebooks. None agrees with the other, and only one of them ‘knows’ I am in St Quentin, which the other two ignore. I don’t want to write my own guidebook, but I think it is a day to find my own route, and to go exploring. I am trying to get to Tergnier. The Italian book would like me to take two days to get there by making another ‘interesting’ diversion to a town called Tugny-et-Pont, then to Suzy (Aha! A boy named Sue!!), and then on to Laon over three days. This seems a little perverse. So I will aim to get there in two days using my own route in the spirit of Vasco da Gama.

The hotel owner asked me over breakfast where I was going today and he invited me to use his laptop to look at the map – much easier than on a phone. I aimed to get to a place called Tergnier. It would be possible to go the shortest way walking along the side of the main road, but after 2 or 3km along this same road yesterday that is not appealing. There is a canal which runs all the way from St Quentin to Tergnier, which is called the St Quentin canal, imaginatively. Canals are still important around these parts. They seem very well kept and they are a good deal wider than those I know in Ireland or England. The very nature of canals means that generally you can walk alongside them easily, on the towpath on which, long ago, the horse would have walked.

I looked at the canal route but although it was attractive it was far too long, taking a big dog leg out to the west before coming back in to Tergnier. But I was abe to pick out a route through small villages which would eventually link me with the canal and so I set off. Once again the names sound very nice – Gauchy, Grugies, Castres, Contescourt, Seraucourt-Le-Grand. Seraucourt-Le-Grand was a very special place, deserving the name Le Grand as it had a supermarket where a kindly lady made me a sandwich for later, of ham and crudites. Further on in the village was a bar-tabac so I had a coffee and took the chance to recharge my phone – always a risk that it may run out of charge if I am using it a lot for navigation. A cheerful man at the bar asked me lots of questions in French, and told me had been to Durham, and then asked me if I had come from Canterbury (which he had visited in his time) had I then swum La Manche. Oh how I laughed at his wit! It was an extremely sunny day and getting very hot. I passed a carpodrome – you can catch your own carp and they will cook it for you. I was not tempted.

Soon after this in the middle of a very large field indeed, I came upon one of the most unlikely things I have seen yet. A post at the side of the road with a number of GR balises – these are the (usually) red and white stripes which mark official French walking paths, but you need to know a lot of supplementary information if they are going to be useful to you, and essentially a map. This one said Compostela (turn right) and Via Francigena (keep on ahead). This is a point at which one of the Camino paths, from Belgium I would imagine crosses the VF heading south. In fact this proximity was the reason the Italian guidebook urged me to divert to Tugny-et-Pont nearby, although it was offering me a basic albergue serving both routes in a town with ‘no facilities, no shop, no bar, no restaurant.’ Not sufficient attraction for me to divert.

I passed through Clastres with an affecting sculpture on the village war memorial. The words on the second photo say ‘Forget me not is the other name which the Saxons (English and German) have given to Myosotis.’

And then with the help of Google I took off along a path for a good while alongside a major railway line. And this led me finally as planned to the St Quentin Canal. This was very fortunate as Google Maps wanted to me to continue on on a path on the far side of the canal, and the only possible way to do this would have been to climb up on to the railway bridge, (something which is commonly done at a place near the beginning of the Camino del Norte, but hardly to be recommended.

The canal took me in gently the last 8km or so right into the centre of Tergnier. I settled under a tree to eat my very rare sandwich and watched an enormous barge – they seem to carry maize or wheat – negotiate a lock. They are completely automatic, with no personnel present. The boat was called Ottimista, or Optimist and was being sailed by a young Belgian couple. Note that they had brought their car along with them too. Over the eight km in to Tergnier, I beat them, but this was because they had to negotiate four locks in that distance.

Although another long day on my feet it felt quite a bit easier than yesterday. The walk along the canal was restful. I hope  Vasco da Game would be proud of my navigating skills, although his own were rather more impressive.

I have still to meet another pilgrim…..