Robyn Hoodie, the Virgin Diaries - Chapter 31: Blood, Sweat and Tears
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Chapter 31: Blood, Sweat and Tears
I woke up in the early aftermorning to the sound of messages coming in. Dad sent me a list of items that they had forgotten to pack, tasking me to collect those and bring them with me on the bus. Sigh...! I'd rather have a quiet day, but no, more chores.
The rest of the afternoon I was haunted with messages reminding me to turn off the water mains and gas, close all windows (the ones on the computer and the ones letting light into the house), clear out the fruit basket, lock the door and hand over my key to the neighbours who will be watering the plants. When the time came to leave, my backpack was very heavy, although it must be said that my food and drinks rations for in the bus might be the main culprits.
My trip to the French Alps consisted of two stages, with a change in Central Paris, around midnight. (another reason to send me instead of one of the girls). After a short stretch by train to the nearest city and some surprisingly healthy fast food for dinner, I had to catch my first bus at a rather random bus stop along a main exit road some way away from the city centre. There was no timetable, just a QR code on a pole that installed an app to enable me to track the whereabouts of the chosen bus. It was late, so I still had time to check out the influencers 'admiring' the local artwork in the grass patch between the lanes.
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When two identical buses arrived at the same time, it took some effort to find out which one I should be boarding as there were no signs on the outside indicating the destination. My seat next to the staircase of the double-decker bus allowed me to stretch my feet a bit, provided I pulled them back every time someone wanted to use the stairs. Luckily, there weren't that many people on board.
On the move and all plugged in, it was time to check on the others. Heavy traffic and the price of a Swiss toll sticker had led them to the more scenic route through rural France. They were now desperately searching for a Camping Municipal that wasn't 'Complet' and somewhere to eat that hadn't closed down after COVID. Looking in my backpack, I concluded that food was not going to be my problem, so I sent some photos of my stock of crisps, candy bars and salami to tease them.
Just when I thought we were getting in the vicinity of my Paris switchover, the bus driver veered of for an obligatory 45 minutes rest break in the middle of freaking-dull nowhere. Because I could already smell sharp odour of the public toilets in the rest area from inside the bus, I decided that I wouldn't bother going out.
Once legally rested and topped up with energy drinks, the bus driver decided he was ready to tackle the Périférique at breakneck speed, sometimes leaving only a hand's width between the bus and obstacles like passenger cars, concrete barriers and late dog-walkers, weaving through traffic like there would be no tomorrow. (I can now attest that there was a tomorrow after all, but it was a close thing some times).
The Paris underground bus exchange is a huge cavern. Even around midnight it was very crowded, with loads of people that were not feeling comfortable due to lack of sleep, money, tickets or all three combined. This time, the bus was completely booked. The air conditioning and ventilation systems clearly weren't made to cope with the amount of sweaty armpits inside. Our departure was severely hampered by the lady who bought a ticket for the wrong date but declined to wait for her bus tomorrow, despite the bus being clearly full. Some armed security guys eventually managed to forcefully disconnect the fingers of the screaming
and thrashing lady from the door opening.
The next bit of entertainment took place at the last stop before crossing the French border, when it became clear that an asylum seeker was trying to get into Italy, despite an already active asylum procedure in France. Apparently this is illegal, and the bus driver didn't want to risk further trouble, so we left with an extra empty seat, leaving a sad and disillusioned guy on the pavement. Despite the extra room, I was still stuck in my window seat, surrounded by a group of mid-twenties guys that hadn't seen a shower for at least a week, who only spoke some Eastern-European language I didn't know.
You can understand that I was happy to finally get off the bus at 10 in the morning. The only drawback was that I still had to get back into France, on the other side of the mountain. This turned out to require a short ride on the train through the valley and a four hour, 14 km hike across the mountain ridge. The navigation app on my phone helped me to find the optimum route. It didn't help me carry my heavy pack or provide the toilet I was in desperate need of since leaving the bus. A small cluster of trees, several hairpins up the mountain brought relief. I later learned that the village down in the valley was ravaged by a flood the next day, but this was probably caused by the massive thunderstorm that night rather than by my fluid release.
While scrambling up the last bit of the steep and narrow gravel path, I heard a ripping noise as some thorny bush tore into the fabric of my trousers and attempted to do the same thing to the skin on my leg. That hurt! Lacking a first aid kit, I fixed things with a bit of the duct tape I was carrying on Dad's request. I vowed to do the removal of the tape myself, nice and slowly, to avoid too much hair removal from my leg.
Thus slightly battered, I came up on the pass and back into France. The French side was much flatter and grassier, so whole families were gathered for picknick. If I had had a mirror, I would have understood why all the kids ran off screaming upon my arrival. (apparently I had wiped my bloody hands on my face, giving me a bit of a grimy horror character look).
Messages of the impending arrival on the campsite of the rest of the extended family made me speed up on the way down, despite a pounding feeling in my leg and a parched throat. (I used some of my water reserve to clean the wound and the bottle of lemon, lime and ginger potion I made by boiling up the contents of the fruit basket just before departure turned out to be too potent for undiluted consumption).
When I was about to pass a small stone chapel, the Twins jump-scared me and then pulled me into the small building for decency's sake. We arrived at the campsite about an hour later. The tents had already been pitched and the others had passed out in the shade. Opening one eye and covering her nose in disgust, Mom told me to go take a shower immediately and put on my remaining set of clothing.
