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| At the foot of the bench of La Roche des Fees |
Today was my last day of the Proetz! This is great for all sorts of reasons. Firstly, no more in-depth plumbing of my sinuses - henceforth all I have to do is nasal irrigation, breathing in mist, and breathing in air, plus sitting quietly in a room that is electrically charged (or something like that) and drink a mug of the current water vintage. Farewell pain!
An even better reason to celebrate the cessation of Proetzing is no more waiting to see the Chief Proetzier! The routine is, you get up at the crack of dawn - well, 7 am, I can't get up earlier because my French alarm clock defaults to 7 and I haven't figured out how to change this yet - and do the ablution stuff before you drag yourself into the Proetz waiting room. There you take a number. There are always at least 20 people ahead of you. The room is full of people waiting, each with their own strain of a cold. If you wait amongst them you will catch their cold, it is a dead cert, I have six years of experience with this. Viral transmission is aided by the atmosphere which is humid and warm.
I calculated a long time ago that each patient takes 2 minutes - ie 20 numbers ahead of me means 40 minutes waiting. I take a number and skedaddle. I buy a newspaper, get a croissant, a coffee, and find a quiet place to roost. After 40 minutes I return to the Proetz Palace, wait a minute or three, and undergo the usual procedure. Then I do the rest of the cure, which takes about 45 minutes.
So as you can see, the Proetz is a huge time waster, and responsible for the fact that I spend every holiday in la Bourboule being sick for at least the first two weeks. Which means of course that I can't get much done, aside from sleeping and eating and watching DVDs. But as of tomorrow I am proetz-free, and my current cold is only under-medium-grave, so I am planning great things for my future. Item, a day trip to Clermont Ferrand! You read this right, I am having ideas above my station and nothing will stop me. I have never tried this before, and am terribly excited. Eh, by the way, I had a tip-off that there is a shop that sells my favourite scarves in Clermont Ferrand ....
Buoyed up by my new found freedom from sinal irritation I climbed up La Roche des Fees earlier today. One of the problems encountered by a blogger in la Bourboule is that it is difficult not to repeat oneself - there just isn't all that much going on, and the town has just 2000 inhabitants, who lead blameless, worthy, lives and give little rise to gossip or news of any kind. So you are going to have to accept a certain amount of repetition in this blog, as well as hazy photos, because the weather isn't always what it should be, photographically speaking.
La Roche des Fees overlooks la Bourboule. It was here that the fairies told two small children about the healing waters on which the fame of the town as a spa rests, and it is here that my sponsored bench is located. The plaque has become a little tarnished, and I shall have to polish it up a bit in the next few days - I want it to gleam and glitter for miles around!
La Roche des Fees actually has two summits, if you can call it that, and sometimes I walk/climb up to the second one as well. It, too, has a bench, but the view is less spectacular. Also it doesn't have a plaque - there is only one bench in a Bourboule with a plaque, and that is mine!
Anyway, here are the photos:
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| Bottom of the stairs that lead to the Roche des Fees |
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| On the right hand side of the stairs - interesting art work or just dilapidation? |
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| Bottom of the stairs |
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| Going up |
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| and up |
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| Almost there - there is a parking place for those who take the lazy option |
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| towards the summit |
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| dito |
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| View of la Bourboule - told you it was hazy - can you see my hotel just right of the middle? |
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| The two top windows either side of the corner are mine! I e a total of four... |
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| The bench |
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| la Banne is usual photogenic |
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| Example of signpost that lacks information - quite usual in these parts, never figured out why they bother with an empty sign post? To confuse tourists? Survival of the fittest and all that? Ran out of paint? |
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| Towards the other summit |
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| More local art work |
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| the other summit |
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| The other, lesser, bench |
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| Green green everything green! |
