Vineyard joggings

Published by Sally on October 11, 2012

It really was pitch black

It really was pitch black

(aka the jog blog – thanks @thewinebird). Having taken up (very slow) jogging again in the summer of 2012, I thought it might be fun to share some microclimatic observations.

Languedoc, October 2012.

Well, before I left the UK I had the presence of mind to check sunrise time in Carcassonne – 0750.  Mmm. Our itinerary says we’re leaving the hotel at 0815 having breakfasted and checked out.  Clearly my newly-acquired bicycle light (both the light and the bicycle newly acquired), needed to be packed.

I was imagining tramping through pitch black vineyard tracks, so was delighted to find out our hotel was immediately outside Carcassonne’s beautiful, fortified city.  A quick (slow as it happened) three laps of La Cité had me done.  Bizarrely the downslopes seemed to occupy more time and space than the upslopes.  And the upslopes were post-Vaillons grade, but pre-grand cru grade (still categorised as ‘frankly too steep to jog’); though since July I can manage short, slightly steeper-than-Vaillon hills, shuffling rather than jogging, on my toes but watching the snails slither ahead of me.

And the view from the hotel's breakfast room

And the view from the hotel's breakfast room

Remembered tales of Cathars and Kate Mosse’s Labyrinth novel kept my rather soft and weedy 21st constitution in its place.



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