Yesterday was a special day for Laurence (his 26th sobriety anniversary, since you asked), marked by cards and visits from friends, and a great sense of pride. Me pushing off on Camino was the only downside – though, to be fair to him, he always says that he’s delighted I’m doing this adventure, and he really misses me.

I’m taking less with me this time. It’s a conscious choice, given the slightly dodgy state of my feet. But the consequence is that I have been more particular about my packing than ever, and I’m not a casual packer. It has paid off – the rucksack is significantly lighter.

The train to London was on time, and I stayed the night at my youngest daughter’s in Hackney. An Uber came at 04.55 to take me to St Pancras, but though I was there before check in had opened, the queue was immense. However, once they did open things moved pretty fast. We were in Paris by 10am local time.

A simple Metro transfer took me to Montparnasse. I visited a market for some bits to eat on the onward journey, and got the obligatory luggage tags you have to have on everything you own (Is it someone’s bag or is it a bomb?) and we left for the Southwest at midday.

It is hard to exaggerate how enormous French trains are. The TGV ones are very long double trains, with up to twenty passenger units. All of these are double-deckers. All of them run on standard guage track. Why do we have such small ones?

Part of the answer may be to do with the differing human geography. France has four times the land mass of England alone, and a slightly smaller population. Taking space for railways is much more contentious in England; monstrous units like they have in France would be even harder to sell.

Mind you it’s not all wine and roses. The route Paris-Bordeaux is very very fast – 300 kph – but the route down to Bayonne and to the border at Hendaye pootles along at about 130 kph and sometimes a lot less, which feels slow after the lightning speed of the first leg.

When we got off at Bayonne, the heat absolutely hit us. It is 34 degrees today. There were a lot of people huddling in the coolest spots they could find, and nobody in the direct sun. Thankfully, this fourth leg of my journey, to get me to where I pick up the trail, is blissfully air-conditioned.

Orthez was much the same, but because it was two hours later it didn’t feel as feel as fierce. It is a beautiful town, and where I staying is in the old historic centre.

It was too hot to go for more than a brief stroll this evening – I had hoped to get to the advertised Saturday evening mass at the lovely old church. But when I turned up at the advertised time it was barred and bolted. No explanation, not even ‘fermeture exceptionnel’! I was rather disappointed, and returned to my digs. In any event, today started at 4am and I am ready for an early night before I get on the road tomorrow.